The Nightmare After Christmas
by Sydney Daimao
Summary: Molly, Dr. Finkelstein's daughter, finds herself in an odd sort of friendship with the suposedly dead Oogie Boogie. But how long will friendship with the Boogie man last? Especially when he claims HE was the victim of last year's Christmas fiasco! R&R!
1. Intro

Disclaimer: I do not own The Nightmare Before Chirstmas, Tim Burton does. If I did then well…I wouldn't be writing this fan fic now would I? It'd be a movie! Molly Finkelstien is an original character made by me though.

Intro

A cold breeze was blowing though the air of the most dismal looking town anyone would ever see. The main colors were of the darkest of all the colors, with lots of black, browns, grays and any other dark and depressing one could think of. It was a place only the dead could feel comfortable in, and they were. All the townspeople wanted this year to be their best yet, as they devoted everyday to make their special day as frighteningly horrible as they possibly could. Even though Halloween was a good three months away, everyone was acting as if it was the next day with the way they ran around doing their parts to prepare. Though in a rush, they all seemed quite joyful in their own devious ways, except for one, the newest member of Halloween Town.

She was a rag doll, and bore a slight resemblance to one named Sally, Jack Skellington, the Pumpkin King's girlfriend, though when looked at more closely it was obvious that she was not Sally. No, this was Dr. Finkelstein's "daughter", Molly Finkelstein. Dr. Finkelstein created her not long after he created his wife, Jewel, since she wanted to have a daughter, so he made her one, and based her off the same design he had made for Sally, though with several differences. Molly's hair was not the auburn red that Sally's was, instead it was as black as a Raven's wing, and was cut to her shoulders, while Sally's hair went past her waist. Also, her eyes were green and her stitched on lips had black lipstick instead of the vibrant red that was on her older counterpart. Molly's dress was a full-length, sleeveless bodice dress that was made of soft black leather, one that dipped down to show off her long elegantly stitched neck.

Aside from her physical differences to Sally, Molly was also different personality wise. Her smiles were more devious and she was not as nice, in fact, one of her favorite things to do was to think of new ways to scam the other citizens of Halloween Town. The doctor got complaints from the Mayor, but Dr. Finkelstein would just wave it off as a "harmless prank". Because Molly was in a way like a second daughter, he was not as over protective and less strict with her than he had been with Sally. In fact, it almost seemed that he didn't notice Molly as much. Jewel was the one who had to remind him if she had been gone all day or not. This gave Molly some reason to feel somewhat depressed, though she also found the neglect to be more of a pro than a con, since she got away with pretty much everything with no more than a slap on the wrists.

Besides from conning the people of Halloween Town, she also enjoyed listening to jazzy music, dancing and singing as well as card games and even gambling, which was how she mostly conned the other townsfolk. She also recently got a job, helping the Witches with their shop, by order of the Mayor and Jack Skellington to keep her busy. Molly's friends were also the rambunctious trio, Lock, Shock, and Barrel, who also would help her in some of her other pranks. Though the people thought of them as a nuisance, they figured that it was better than having the three children following Oogie Boogie's orders. It seemed like such a long time since the Boogie Man had been defeated by their Pumpkin King that everyone almost forgot about him. Though there were a few people who still wondered about if he would ever come back somehow, and if so, would he seek revenge?


	2. I: Who is Oogie Boogie?

Disclaimer: I do not own The Nightmare Before Chirstmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's about it.

Author's Note: This fan fic contains some references to the video game, The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge. This is because it shows a lay out of the town so for those of you who have played the game I hope you enjoy finding these references and if not, then I hope you enjoy the fic anyways!

Chapter One: Who's Oogie Boogie?

"Okay people let's go! Only three months until Halloween! We don't have much time left!" The Mayor said for the tenth time in the past hour and a half. A certain raven haired rag doll sighed and rolled her eyes after she heard the Mayor from inside the Witches' Shop.

Molly wished she could find a way to ditch her job at the witches' shop, since all she did there was make treats like bone biscuits and black widow truffles, so she could hang out with Lock, Shock, and Barrel. Yes it was quite unusual for a young woman like herself to want to hang out with three children, but they were the only ones she actually had things in common with. Everyone else seemed so obsessed about preparations for Halloween it made her wish there was no such thing. But, if she missed work again today she knew that the witches would fire her, and then she'd have to help the other townspeople with their preparations.

"Molly you've been such a help to us! Dr. Finkelstein and Jewel must be so proud of you!" The taller Witch said to Molly, snapping her out of her day dream.

The shorter Witch then added, "See, working is much more rewarding than playing pranks and pulling scams! After all…"

The two then began to sing a line from the town's favorite song, _This is Halloween_, "Tender lumplings everywhere, life's no fun without a good scare. That's our job, but we're not mean, in our town of Halloween!"

Molly forced a chuckle, "Ha ha, yes, I know how the song goes…" But the witches started over from the beginning of the song and the rag doll could not help but sigh once again and mouth silently, "Here they go again…" Though this time when she heard the song, she noticed something odd, something she had noticed a few times but never really questioned before; a missing verse. Turning to face her singing bosses, she asked, "Did you miss a verse?"

Both of them looked at her as if she had gone crazy, "No of course we didn't!" the taller witch replied in a defensive tone.

"But I could have sworn that there was a short verse after, _I am the 'who' when you call, 'Who's there?' I am the wind blowing through your hair_ before it starts with the chorus. I mean, it just doesn't sound right…" Molly argued, though she made sure to sound polite about it so that it didn't seem like she was just trying to be belligerent.

"Well…" the shorter witch looked thoughtful for a moment, "I think there was once a very small insignificant part in the song…but I guess nobody remembers it enough to care." The taller witch nodded in agreement.

Whatever they were trying to sell to Molly didn't seem to work, since she gave them a raised brow, "But…if everyone knows the song by heart, how can even a small part be overlooked so much?" If there was anything that Molly had that was similar to her creator, whom insisted she call him father, it would have been his cleverness to figure out almost anything. If she had been gullible, then she wouldn't have made it very far in gambling.

This time it seemed they didn't have a logical explanation, so the taller witch decided to end the conversation, "You know what Molly! Since you worked so hard today, why don't we let you go two hours early!" she proposed as if she just got an ingenious idea.

The other witch nodded as she took a black widow truffle off of a pan that was fresh from the oven and cool enough to eat. "Here, have one of these too! You must want to know how terrible they came out!"

'Bribery...yep, those two are defiantly trying to keep something from me…' Molly thought to herself but pretended not to notice how obvious it was that they were trying to change the subject. "Why thank you!" Taking a bite of the truffle, she then made a pleased sound, "Mmm…they are to die for!"

"Oooh!" the two witches seemed pleased as they clapped their hands together, "Here, have another!" the taller witch offered as she placed another into her hand and began to push her out the door of their small shop. "Now you run along and enjoy yourself on this horrible day!"

After Molly heard the door to the shop close behind her, she shook her head and chuckled softly. "Wow…if questioning them lets me get off of work early, maybe I should question them more often!" she said to herself before she popped the rest of the first black widow truffle into her mouth while putting the other into her dress pocket.

Her ankle high boots made soft click-clack sounds on the stone cobbled ground as she entered the town square with the fountain that looked like a ghoul vomiting green water. Glancing around she then noticed Corpse Kid playing around with a ghoul and a mummy child, and a slightly devious grin spread across her stitched lips. "Hey! Corpse Kid!" she called out, causing the children to turn and look at her. Taking out a deck of playing cards from her other pocket, she then asked, "Wanna play a little game of Bat Snot?" Bat Snot was the Halloween Town version of the card game, Bullshit, the only difference in the game was what you shouted out when you thought the other person was bluffing.

"N-no way!" Corpse Kid replied quickly waving his hands in front of himself to show just how much he really didn't want to play. "The other day when I played with you, you got to keep all my Maggot Muffins!"

This did not discourage Molly though, "Gee…sorry to hear that…" she then placed the cards back into her pocket then took out the Black Widow Truffle from her other one. "Because I was going to ask you for just a quick game…I was going to bet this freshly made truffle…made it myself…it's really good." Molly held the treat out with her dainty thin fingers in a tempting way before she quickly took it away from their view by placing it back in her pocket. "But since you don't want to play…"

At this proposal, it seemed that Corpse Kid had a change of heart, "O-okay, I'll bet a quarter pound bag of Marsh-Marrows for your Truffle."

Molly smiled as she withdrew the cards again and started to shuffle them while taking a seat on the edge of the fountain at the center of town. Corpse Kid decided to stand near her and his friends just gathered around to watch.

A quick game of Bat Snot soon became several since it seemed that Corpse Kid was determined to beat her at her own game. Unfortunately for him, he lost more than just his quarter pound bag of Marsh-Marrows, but also a bag of candy corn and three lollipops shaped like skulls. The children walked away from Molly with their spirits crushed just a bit, that was until they all found a new game to play. The rag doll shuffled her cards before she placed them back into her pocket and looked at her winnings. Of course, she had been known for cheating, but when she played with kids like Corpse Kid she didn't have to. Corpse Kid was lousy at the game since she could tell when he was bluffing from a mile away.

Molly began to wonder what she was going to do with so many sweets, especially since she didn't have much of a sweet tooth; which was quite ironic since her job required her to make them all day. The only reason she ate the Black Widow Truffle was because they were made from actual black widows, and Molly did have a taste for creepy crawlies, especially spiders. In fact, she loved snake and spider stew, and it was one of the few things she took the time to learn to cook, even though her mother, Jewel, did all the cooking.

Just before she decided what she should do with the treats, her answers came up to her, quite literally. They were of course three of Halloween Town's finest Trick-or-Treaters, and her best friends, Lock, Shock, and Barrel. A more sincere smile made its way across her features, "Hey guys!" Molly greeted first.

"Hey!" Greeted Lock first.

Then Shock with, "Hi, what are you doing out of work so early?"

Barrel then asked, "Didja get canned finally!"

Molly chuckled in a light feminine tone, that also sounded mischievous, "No. For some reason, the old hags decided to let me leave early. Though they seemed kind of suspicious about it. All because I called them on a missing verse."

The notorious trio didn't seem to care for the reason Molly was given a short day, just as long as she was with them now. This was made clear when Barrel asked her, "Hey, you gonna eat this candy?"

"No go ahead and split it amongst yourselves." The rag doll replied after shaking her head. Though she didn't exactly expect them to really care; they were cleverer than the other children, but they were still young, and had short attention spans. While Lock Shock and Barrel began to fight over the candy in an a way that would have appalled their parents if they had any, Molly began to go over the song, **_This is Halloween_**, again to see if she could come up with the missing verse. "_…Everybody scream, everybody scream, in our town of Halloween. I am the clown with the tear-away face. Here in a flash and gone without a trace. I am the 'who' when you call, 'Who's there?' I am the wind blowing through your hair…_" she paused as the chorus played in her head then sighed, "…it still just doesn't sound right…"

Lock and Shock pushed Barrel away from the candy grabbing frenzy, and the boy dressed up in the skeleton costume happened to notice Molly singing the town's favorite song, and decided to join in where she left off. "_I am the shadow on the moon at night, filling your dreams to the brim with fright! This is Halloween, this is Halloween…_"

Molly gasped after hearing the verse from the song that she never heard before and stopped the boy from continuing the chorus with her urgent question. "Barrel! You know that verse? Why doesn't anyone sing it though?"

The boy shrugged with a vacant expression, "I dunno…" suddenly he then realized something and smiled. Jumping up and down a few times, he added, "Oh yeah! Probably because that was Oogie's part!"

"Oogie's part?" Molly repeated quizzically.

Suddenly Lock and Shock both cuffed Barrel, "Don't mind him!" Lock tried to cover up his anger with a grin.

"You know how Barrel gets when he's on a sugar high!" Shock added as she took Barrel by the hand and lead him away from Molly. "We better get back to our tree house before he causes too much mischief!"

Lock gave the confused rag doll a salute, "See ya later Molly!" before he ran after his other two friends.

Molly watched as the three left her, taking the candy without a thank you, but she didn't exactly expect much out of them when it came to manners. "Now since when did those three become concerned about causing too much mischief?" she asked herself as her brows narrowed. "I swear it seems like everyone's trying to hide something from me today!" Standing up now she held a determined look, "That's it! I only know of one person who's going to give me a strait answer without avoiding my questions!" Now, this determined rag doll practically marched towards her next destination; Jack Skellington's house.

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

It wasn't until Shock heard the gate that lead into Halloween Town close when she finally decided to let go of Barrel and hit him on the head again. "Stupid!" she berated her cohort. "Why'd you have to go and mention Oogie Boogie like that!"

Looking up at the taller girl, Barrel replied, "I-I was just tellin' her that Oogie use to have a part in the song! That's all I was tellin' her I swear!"

"Oh yeah? You sure!" Lock asked in an accusing tone of voice. "I bet if she asked more questions you would have ended up telling her more than that!"

Barrel shook his head, "Uh-uh! I wasn't gonna tell her that Oogie's bac-" Lock and Shock cut him off by covering his mouth and looked around to see if anyone might have been able to hear their conversation. When they were satisfied that nobody was around, they removed their hands and knocked Barrel over the head with closed fists.

"Dummy! Don't go blabbing around that he's back so close to town!" Lock growled before he and Shock began to walk towards their house.

Poor abused Barrel groaned in pain as he rubbed his head a little then followed his friends. "Sorry…you think Oogie'll be in a better mood today?"

"I don't know," replied Shock with a shrug, "He's been awfully moody since we stitched him back up."

"Well he did get his butt kicked last Christmas by Jack!" Lock said, "I'd be pretty mad too! Plus I think he's getting bored, what with him trying to keep a low profile about him still being alive. He must be dying to find a way to get back at Jack."

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

Once Molly finished climbing up the steps to Jack's house, she pulled on the small spider that was attached to the string to sound the doorbell, which was of course, a high pitched scream. She waited a few moments before she pulled it again. "Hey! Jack! Sally!" Knowing it was quite stupid, she even added, "…Zero!" Groaning, she then decided to knock, but just as she was about to bang her fist upon the door, it opened just enough to be slightly ajar. Blinking a few times, she looked around, and wondered why the door did that. Molly shrugged it off and decided to go on in to at least check if anyone was home.

The door made a long creak as she opened it more and invited herself into the Skellington home, then closed it behind her. "It's not like they'll know I'm here…I'll just look really quickly through his library to see if there's any mention of an Oogie…" she stated, trying to convince herself that there was nothing wrong with being in a person's house who wasn't even home. Wasting no time, she began to climb the spiraled staircase while continuing to talk to herself to keep away the eerie silence around the house. It seemed even Zero wasn't home, or else the ghost dog would have surely been barking at the sudden intrusion. "Oogie…never heard of him before. Did he use to live here? What's so bad about Oogie's verse anyways? And why does everyone seem to avoid questions about this person?"

When Molly reached the last step she found herself looking around the small room. "Hum…now what books might have records of people in Halloween Town?" she asked to the air as she scanned the bookshelf with her emerald green eyes. There were several books where she might find some answers, but they were huge, just looking through one would take more time than she had. "Darn it!" she stamped her foot, "Why can't anything be easy around here!" Glancing around the room to see if maybe amongst the scattered books there was one labeled, All about Oogie, or something along those lines, but it was in vain.

But her eyes did notice the old record player that was in the room, with a record labeled, This is Halloween, on it. "Bingo!" the raven haired rag doll declared with a victorious smile as she walked over to it. Once she figured out how to get it to work, the song began to play and she waited patiently for the verse that she discovered this afternoon while leaning close to the horn like instrument that allowed the music to be heard. It didn't take too long until she heard the voice of the person who had irked her curiosity. It was a soft tone, yet it was deep and it sent a shiver up her spine when she heard the words Oogie sang. That indeed was a voice that could fill her dreams to the brim of fright!

"How did you get in here Molly?" a male voice asked suddenly, causing Molly to let out a short scream of surprise as she jerked her head to face the speaker. Her eyes glanced up to meet the gaze of the dark sockets of Jack Skellington, who had one socket raised up slightly to show his bemusement of her presence.

Shaking off her surprise, Molly answered in a self-assured way as to not tip off Jack that she was lying. "Sally let me in. I came to visit her, but she had to leave a few minutes ago, you just missed her. I was just about to leave though…"

Of course, Sally had to climb up the stairs right after Molly told her almost perfectly good lie. "Jack? Is something the matter? I thought I heard a scream…" her eyes then feel upon Molly. She smiled kindly at her, "Oh, hello, how'd you get in Molly?"

"That's exactly what I was just asking her…" the Pumpkin King replied to his girlfriend before he continued to speak to Molly. "Sally and I were just at Town Hall with the Mayor discussing plans for this year's Halloween." He then folded his thin boney arms over his chest while drumming his skeletal fingers on his boney bicep. "So… care to explain how Sally was able to invite you in and be at Town Hall at the exact same time?"

'Darn it…caught lying to the Pumpkin King…this day just keeps getting better and better!' thought Molly while mentally rolling her eyes at her misfortune.

Though her luck seemed to brighten up a bit when Jack turned to Sally and asked her, "Sally, you know what I am craving, some pumpkin bread!"

The redheaded rag doll smiled at the skeleton man and replied, "How about I make some then?" she then climbed back down the stairs, giving Jack and Molly some privacy to talk.

"Now…tell me, what was so important for you to come into the house uninvited?" Jack asked, though he used a softer tone with her now as he turned off the record player.

Deciding that it was now or never, Molly responded sternly, "Jack, I want to know something, but everyone keeps avoiding my questions! Even Lock, Shock and Barrel seem to be hiding something from me!"

The skeleton man looked surprised as he blinked his empty sockets once. "Well, maybe I can help answer these questions of yours?"

"That's why I came over!" taking a deep breath to calm herself, Molly then asked in a more polite way, "I want to know…who's Oogie? What's so bad about him? Why is his part in **_This is Halloween_** song missing all of a sudden if it was on the record?"

There was a long pause of silence as Jack tried to compile his thoughts to answer all of Molly's questions. He rubbed his skull with a deep sigh as he proceeded to explain, "It's a long, long story…"

"Well I'm not going anywhere…" Molly replied in a dull tone.

Jack began walking down the stairs and Molly followed as he spoke, "I'll start from the beginning. You see, nobody is really sure where Oogie Boogie came from, but we do know he's not originally from Halloween Town. The reason why his part is left out in the song it because last year…"

"MOLLY FINKELSTEIN!" a shrill shout interrupted Jack. Molly and Jack turned to see Jewel standing at the front door with a sheepish looking Sally standing next to her.

"Heh heh…" Sally chuckled nervously, "Jewel's here to take Molly home Jack."

Both Molly and Jack looked at each other at the same time, though Jack's was a bit more curious than Molly's. "Well, thank you for all your help Jack." Molly said in a polite tone since her mother was right there, and even gave a short curtsy before walking towards her mother.

Jewel looked very much like Dr. Finkelstein at the moment, with the way she was scowling. Once Molly exited the Skellington house though, she put on a smile and said in a thankful tone, "Thank you for looking after Molly, so sorry that she came unannounced."

"It wasn't a problem at all Jewel…" Jack began to say before Jewel marched out of the house and slammed the door behind her.

"She's got the doctor's temper…" Sally commented softly a few moments after the two Finkelstein women left.

"I can tell…" responded Jack.

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

"Why did you leave the Witches' Shop so early!" Jewel asked in a stern interrogative way as she marched towards Dr. Finkelstein's Laboratory in with hastened steps with a stuck up sort of air about her. "I went there to check up and see how well you've been doing in your new work environment and find that you take off two hours early!"

Molly rolled her eyes at her mother's back, "Didn't they tell you they gave me an early day?"

"That is not important!" snapped Jewel before she continued her ranting, "And then I hear from Corpse Mother that she saw you talking to those…" she then paused and said with a disgusted look on her face as if the next word would leave a nasty taste in her mouth, "…**_children_**…"

"Lock, Shock, and Barrel are my friends…" Molly replied, before she added with that same distasteful tone Jewel used to identify her friends, "…**_mother_**…"

Jewel didn't seem to catch what her daughter said, that, or she didn't care. "That's not all Corpse Mother told me either! Then she told me she saw you sneaking over to the Skellington house! Just what was it you were trying to do there? Oh the things you put me through, Molly! You might not care about your reputation in the Town as being a delinquent or a home wrecker, but will you think about the other people whose reputations will suffer because of yours!"

"Home wrecker?" Molly repeated taken aback by her mother's accusation. "What are you talking about?"

Tucking a blonde strand of hair behind her ear, Jewel proceeded to explain, "Well, it's obvious that you went there to see Jack! I don't know how Sally can be so trusting, leaving him alone in the presence of a beautiful troubled girl like yourself! Oh!" Placing a hand to her forehead acting like she were about to faint, "I don't know what I'd do if I became known as the mother of the Town's home wrecker!"

"Oh mother!" moaned Molly as she slapped her own forehead at the crazy idea Jewel came up with. "It's not like that! I was just asking Jack some questions about the upcoming Halloween." After telling her mother the quick lie to calm her down, she added another with a sincere tone of voice, "I was thinking of maybe doing my own special part this year, so I was asking him certain things to see if my ideas weren't taken already."

At this news, Jewel seemed to calm down quite a bit and gave a sigh of great relief, "Oh…my goodness. Please forgive me dear, but you know how rumors can spread!"

"Yeah…especially since you spread most of them yourself…" Molly muttered before Jewel continued on chattering, but this time it was in praise.

"Well that sounds like a marvelous idea! I just hope you can finish everything up in time! My daughter you are so inventive! Just like your father!" This comment caused the rag doll to roll her eyes at the sudden change in her mother's attitude before the blonde creation turned to face her. "So, what it is you're planning?"

Giving her mother an innocent smile, she replied, "I can't tell you, or else it would ruin the surprise!"

Jewel looked satisfied with that answer, but that was mostly because they had reached the Laboratory. As Jewel opened the door she continued talking, "Oh, perhaps you might be able to win an award this year if your Halloween idea is great! And it will be! After that you won't be considered the town delinquent anymore! Won't that be marvelous?"

"Yeah…it sure would be…" Molly replied unenthusiastically without looking back at the blonde creation as she climbed up the metal railing towards Sally's old room which was now her own. When she did enter her room, she closed the door behind her with yet another sigh. The rag doll realized she had been doing that a lot lately, and figured that perhaps she might have been a little depressed. Walking towards the window of the room she looked out and had a good view of the town, which also had a view of the Skellington house. "I still didn't get any of my questions about Oogie Boogie answered." she said to herself with a frown.

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

Ta-da! Well that's chapter one of The Nightmare After Christmas! Yes, I am aware that title sounds kinda lame, but it wasn't taken surprisingly and I couldn't think of anything better for it, because it does take place **after** that notorious Christmas night. So don't be afraid to tell me what you think of it so far, even though it's kinda hard to judge since it's only chapter one. I try to keep all the characters in character as much as possible.

Oh and if you wonder who Jewel is, she's the one who is pushing the Doctor in his wheelchair at the end of the movie. Nobody really knows if that's her name, but he does call her "his precious jewel" so some fans just kinda nick-named her that. She came off to me as one who would kinda like having a high social status, so that would include having a perfect daughter, why she sounds like such a mean heartless hag. In a way, she's only looking out for her own reputation.

Any-who, I will try to update the next chapter soon, as well as other chapters for my stories. Next chapter will actually have Oogie in it! So please read and review and hopefully come back to read more when I update!

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	3. II: Betrayal of Boogie’s Boys

Disclaimer: I do not own The Nightmare Before Chirstmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's about it.

Author's Note: Thank you all who reviewed this fic so far! So far no negative comments. Oh and by the way, I forgot to mention this in chapter one, but this fic is dedicated to one of my best friends and my first Super Duper Helper, Marissa! This is for you Mar, the biggest Oogie fan I know!

Chapter Two: Betrayal of Boogie's Boys

Meanwhile, underneath the tree house where Lock, Shock and Barrel took up residence in, the lair that belonged to the supposedly deceased Oogie Boogie, had a visitor. It was a spider about the size of a golf ball, and it was scurrying around the lethal contraptions down in the foreboding casino like lair. The curious spider stopped crawling when it got near an iron maiden before it was suddenly snatched by a burlap hand. "Ooooh! You'll be a perfect addition to the stew!" a boisterous voice commented with a soft menacing laugh.

The giant, fully restored burlap sack full of bugs began to walk towards where he had a large pot over a fire and tossed the spider visitor into the boiling pot that was filled with a mixture of other randomly found spiders and a few snakes. The innocent spider tried to surface from the scolding hot stew desperately in its attempt to escape, but it didn't take very long for it to give up and sink into the rest of the stew, causing a little bubble after it was fully submerged. Another soft chuckle escaped Oogie as he watched with an unsettling amount of enjoyment. The boogie man then took a wooden spoon and stirred up the boiling contents of the pot before he tasted it. A deep rumble came from his chest in a satisfied sound, "Mmmm! Another perfect batch of Snake and Spider stew!" he declared in triumph, throwing his arms up in the air like he did something that seemed impossible. After several moments of standing in that position, Oogie sighed and let his arms fall down to his sides, while his shoulders dropped as well. "The third perfect batch I've made in the past two days…" he added with a bit of annoyance to his tone.

"We're BAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!" announced the three small children, Lock, Shock, and Barrel in unison after they got off the large old fashioned bird cage elevator that came from down the side of their tree house to the back entrance of Oogie's lair. As his three henchmen came to line up in front of him, Oogie stood with his arms folded over his chest with an impatient look on his face.

Lock and Shock tried not to notice the look on Oogie, while Barrel noticed the freshly made stew. He, along with Lock and Shock, loved it whenever Oogie made stew, and it was usually a reward for them, though the Boogie man had been making it a lot recently. "Ooh! Stew again!" he stated with a wide smile, earning him a smack on the head from both of his cohorts.

Putting on a devious looking smile, Oogie asked as he placed down the spoon and began to rub his hands together in a diabolical way. "So, what news have you three brought me today?"

"Uhhh…" Boogie's boys began to look at each other nervously since they had nothing to tell their intimidating leader.

Lock decided to answer first, "Nothing new has happened in the past day."

"Everyone's still preparing for Halloween." Shock added.

"Can we have some stew?" asked Barrel as he grabbed the spoon Oogie used to stir with and was about to get a taste until Oogie smacked it out of his hand, causing the shortest of the three children to back away and stand with the other two.

"That's what you've been telling me for the past two weeks strait!" Oogie yelled with a frustrated growl. "Does it take the three of you all day to go into town and realize that there's nothing new going on!"

"W-well…no…" the three stuttered, taking a step back, which only caused the Boogie man to advance closer to them.

"Well then…" Oogie began in a soft tone before he yelled, "…WHAT DOES TAKE UP YOUR TIME THERE!"

Before Lock and Shock could tell Oogie a quick lie, Barrel replied, "We go to visit our friend Molly." Right after Barrel spoke those words, Lock, and Shock gave him death glares, since they went into town to not really get reports for Oogie, but to spend time with the rag doll. The three of them greatly preferred Molly's company to Oogie's, since she came up with all sorts of fun pranks to pull while the Boogie man seemed to be in a rut with his own evil plans.

"Oh, your friend Molly, huh?" crooned Oogie with a suspicious sounding interest. "Well then…why don't you invite your little friend, **_Molly_**, over to…**_play_**?" He asked, emphasizing on the name of the rag doll and the word play with a sickening niceness that almost made the Boogie man nauseous.

Lock, Shock, and Barrel all knew what Oogie Boogie really meant was that he wanted them to bring Molly to his secret lair. No doubt he would make sure that afterwards, they would never be able to visit her again. The only people who ever escaped Oogie's torture chamber were Santa Clause, and Sally last Christmas, and that was with the help of Jack. "W-when did you want to…meet her?" they all asked, fearing that they already knew the answer to it.

"How about right now?" suggested Oogie, though the children knew it was more of an order, despite the way he said it. "Invite her over for a little slumber party…one that she'll never want to leave! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Reluctantly, the children nodded and responded, "Y-yes your Boogieness…we'll go get her as soon as possible." They knew not to question the Boogie man, who might decide to make them into his next batch of stew.

The children did not speak a word to each other as they rode in their walking bathtub until it crossed over the bridge and headed towards town. "I can't believe you had to open your big mouth and tell him about Molly!" scolded Shock as she began to choke Barrel without warning.

As Barrel began to turn blue in the face from lack of air, Lock pushed Shock back to stop her then smacked Barrel around himself. "Now Oogie's gonna kill her!"

With a guilty look, Barrel replied, "I-I didn't mean to! Can't we just…not get Molly?"

"NO!" the other two shouted, causing the shorter child to cringe.

"If we did that, then Oogie Boogie would do what he would do to her, to us instead!" Lock stated with a frown.

Shock then added fiercely to get the point across, "It's either her, or us! Do you like snake and spider stew enough to become part of one!"

Barrel shuttered at the thought of being put into a boiling pot, and thought of how he preferred to watch other things to be thrown into them. "N-no!" With a sigh, the boy then stated, "I'm gonna miss Molly…" The other two malicious children nodded in agreement with sad frowns.

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

While these events were taking place, Jewel and Molly were sitting down at a table that was placed in the lower level of the Laboratory on the far end where the stove was. As usual, Dr. Finkelstein was eating in the room where he participated in experiments with Igor, leaving Molly to eat alone with Jewel again. "Well, dig in Molly! It's your father's favorite tonight! Worm's Wart soup!"

Molly looked down at the green liquid in the cracked bowl in front of her. The side of her mouth curved downward before she asked her mother, "Can't we ever have something like…Snake and Spider stew?"

This suggestion didn't seem to please her mother, "That's an acquired taste Molly, and you know your father and I hate that stuff. I have no idea why you like it."

With a sigh of defeat, Molly then picked up her spoon and took a sip of soup. No matter what it was she would suggest for her mother, if she didn't like it, then there was no way of it ever happening and it seemed that every idea she had, her mother didn't like. There was a long period of silence between the two creations as they ate, until it occurred to Molly that perhaps her mother would have an idea about Oogie Boogie. Jewel always had an opinion about everyone in the town, which was often critical, including her opinion of Jack. "Mother?" the raven haired rag doll inquired softly to catch her attention. Jewel looked up from her bowl, her eyes focused on Molly completely. "You know everyone in Halloween Town, right?"

"Ha!" Jewel scoffed in an arrogant way, "Of course I do! Being the most social woman of this town, I should hope so!"

"Then you'd know Oogie Boogie, right?" Molly asked, perking up a bit. Since it seemed that nobody wanted this person to be remembered, her mother would definitely know the reason to why.

"Who?" Jewel replied, giving a puzzled look to her daughter.

"Oogie Boogie." Molly repeated, her excitement toned down a little, "You know…right?"

The blonde shook her head, "Sorry dear, I'm afraid I don't know a Boogie character. Perhaps he left before your father made me." Taking another sip of soup, she then added, "You should ask your father, he'll know, he knows everything!" At this comment, Molly rolled her eyes at her arrogant mother who had a superiority complex, since she was sure that her father knew a lot, yet not everything. If he did, then he wouldn't have let Sally slip poison into his food so much in the past.

After Molly finished the rest of her meal silently, she excused herself and began to climb up the metallic railing up to the highest part of the laboratory to visit her father. When she entered the room, Igor was the first one to notice her, since her father had tuned out everything and focused on the experiment he was working on. Igor gave her a smile that would make anyone want to cringe because of how crooked his teeth were. Molly however, was use to his smiles. "Master…" croaked the hunched back assistant to catch the doctor's attention, "…it's Molly."

Dr. Finkelstein stopped what he was doing and turned his wheelchair around to face his daughter. He smiled, "Ah, if it isn't my favorite daughter!" he declared, "Just what brings you up here my dear?"

Molly smiled when her father called her his favorite daughter, since she knew that he actually preferred her to Sally. She had gotten into a lot of mischief, and swindled the townsfolk on several of occasions, but she never poisoned his food. That was what kept her in his good favor. "I got some questions for you daddy, and I think you're the only person who's going to give me answers. Who is Oogie Boogie? What happened to him? Why isn't he in town anymore?"

"Ha ha!" Dr. Finkelstein laughed as he shook his head a little. "My dear, you are quite inquisitive today, aren't you? But that's proof that you're my daughter. Now, it's not really about who Oogie Boogie is, more like, who he was."

"Was?" Molly blinked taken aback a little. "You mean he's…?"

"Yes, the Boogie man is no longer with us." Her father nodded as he confirmed Molly's assumption. "But that's a good thing really. Those no good brat friends of yours, no offense, use to sneak into my lab to steal inventions of mine! Don't know what for. As far as I know, he never really lived in town, and he was dealt with last year around Christmas by Jack."

Molly seemed disappointed at this news, "Oh."

"Any other questions my girl?" her father asked, popping the top of his head open and scratching his brain inside.

"No, it's okay, thank you daddy." Molly replied smiling a little before she turned to leave.

Dr. Finkelstein turned his wheelchair back to his work and responded, "It is not a problem my child. If you have any more questions, don't be afraid to ask."

After visiting her father, Molly went back to her room and flopped onto her bed with a depressed sigh. It was too bad that Oogie Boogie was now not around, it would have been interesting to meet someone new around the predictable world she lived in. Maybe he would have posed a challenge in a game of cards, or perhaps he would have been another sucker for her to dupe. Sadly, she would never know. Something puzzled her though, why would Jack want to do away with a member of their world? Her father never really stated that he did anything wrong, except maybe send Lock, Shock, and Barrel to steal some things from his lab, but that didn't sound like a crime punishable by death. If that was the law, she would have been dead a long time ago.

As she thought to herself in silence, a small tap on her window broke the silence and caught her attention. Sitting up, she looked to her window, where she thought she heard the noise coming from. There was nothing there. Raising a brow slightly, she continued to watch the window until something was tossed at her window again, making a tap identical to the first one. Someone was trying to get her attention outside. Getting out of bed, Molly then walked over to the window and opened it. First she looked around to the sides, then up, then finally down to see her three juvenile friends.

Smiling sincerely down at them, she then realized that it was actually a little late for them to be visiting her; at least it would be to her mother. "What are you guys doing here?" she asked in a hushed voice, trying to speak loud enough for them to hear, yet not loud enough for anyone else inside to listen in.

The trio were standing inside of their walking bathtub smiling up at the rag doll woman they called friend. "Common Molly!" Shock responded, sounding excited about something.

"We got something we want you to see!" Lock added, sounding just as excited.

"It's at our tree house, and you got to come right now!" Barrel stated with a jump.

Molly looked behind her to see if there was a silhouette under the crack of the bottom of her door. When she saw that there was none, she then looked back down at her friends again. "Okay fine, but this better be really good!"

"Oh it's to die for!" Shock replied.

The rag doll had no idea that the death part of Shock's statement was literal, so her smile grew as she closed the window.

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

In order to get out of the house, Molly told her mother that her father instructed her to run an errand for him to get some more Bone Biscuits to feed Igor. Lock, Shock, and Barrel made room for her to sit inside the bathtub with them, though they got to sit on her legs since there wasn't much room for all four of them. "So what's this great thing you just have to show me right now?" she asked with a chuckle, looking down at Barrel, whom she knew would spill the beans about whatever it was.

"Uhh…" Barrel looked hesitant to answer, and glanced at the other two for help.

"You're just going to have to wait and see!" Lock replied with a grin.

Shock then added, "We think you'll really like it!"

When they reached the tree house, they let Molly enter it first. She looked around inside their playroom, but didn't notice anything that looked amazing. "Okay, so what is it that you wanted to show me?"

The three children looked to one another before Lock pointed at the chute that was painted with white paint to make it look like a monster. "Look into that opening and you'll see what we're talking about!"

Molly gave them a skeptical look, but shrugged her shoulders, not sensing any harm in just taking a look. "Alright." The rag doll then stuck her head into the opening of the chute. Looking around, all she saw was darkness. "I don't see anything you guys!" she stated with a cross look on her face. "Is this some kind of joke?"

"No it's not a joke!" Shock responded. "Keep looking!"

A groan came from Molly, "You've got to be kidding me." She sighed to herself and crawled a little more inside the chute so that part of her torso was inside. Still, all she saw was darkness wherever the long pipe lead to. "You guys, this isn't funny, I'm going home." It was then when she suddenly felt all three of them shove her all the way into the chute, causing her to slide head first through the pipe.

Once she reached the end of the pipe, she fell and hit the ground hard on her stomach. "Oof!" was the response she made to her not so graceful landing before lifting herself up. Once on her feet, she dusted off her dress and straitened it out a bit before she glared at the pipe from where she came from. "LOCK! SHOCK! BARREL!" she shouted up at the now closed off pipe, shaking her fist at it. "WHAT ARE YOU THREE TRYING TO DO? KILL ME!" Not knowing that they had just sent her to her doom, she then looked around for an exit, until she realized what her surroundings were. Green eyes widened at all the things around her. So the three hadn't lied when they said there was something interesting to see.

While Lock, Shock, and Barrel tricked Molly into traveling down the chute to get to his lair, Oogie Boogie had been occupying himself by throwing his red pair of dice around another part of the lair. After throwing the dice for a time that he had lost count of, he looked to see his result, and it was yet again, snake eyes. While the snake emerged from the hole of one dice to slither into another hole on the dice with a mocking hiss, he narrowed his burlap brows with a snarl. Before he had time to curse his luck, he then heard a feminine voice yelling in his torture chamber. With an evil grin, he realized that it must have been that Molly his henchmen mentioned before. Picking up his dice again, he started to walk quietly towards the torture chamber, to get a look at the person whom kept the three trouble makers coming back to town to see her.

Making sure that he was hidden in the shadows, he then peeked inside the room and his empty sockets widened a bit. Here he had been expecting a little girl around Shock's age, but there standing on the roulette table was a rag doll woman. The raven haired beauty was admiring the dangerous contraptions around her that were modeled after things in a casino. "Wow…I can see why he had Lock, Shock, and Barrel steal some of daddy's things…" she said to herself in wonder.

Molly then looked down and noticed she was standing on a giant roulette table for the first time and laughed as she twirled around, giving Oogie a better view of her front and her face as well. The sides of his stitched mouth curled and his snake tongue stuck out of the side a little before he said softly to himself while raising his brows up a few times. "Oooh yeah….Oogie likes!"

The unsuspecting Molly was looking at the three slots men that shot real guns while Oogie was creeping up silently behind her. As he advanced towards her, he continued checking her out until he was a few feet behind her. "Wicked…" she murmured to herself with a grin, causing the Boogie Man's grin to grow more.

"Glad you like it." Oogie spoke softly, causing the rag doll to let out a gasp and jump slightly, much to his delight. When she turned around, her green eyes widened, surprised that she hadn't noticed how dangerously close the glowing neon green burlap sack had gotten to her. Placing his arms on both sides of her body to pin her against the wall, trapping her between the brightly glowing wall of his casino lair and his body, Oogie leered at her with an evil look in his eyes that he hadn't had in the longest time. "Because you…" he began to get his face closer and closer to hers, as his smirk widened, "…are never leavin'!"

(OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO)

Oh no! What's Oogie going to do! How's Molly going to escape the evil clutches of the Oogie Boogie Man! Guess you're going to have to find out in the next chapter! I hope you all enjoyed the second chapter, I've been working on it diligently for a day since we've got a three day weekend. I'd like to thank my two Super Duper Helpers, Marissa and SexySaiyanSakura for helping me with the chapter and even on the chapter title! You guys are awesome, and that's why this chapter came out so well!

I would like to thank the reviewers for the prolog and the first chapter:

SexySaiaynSakura

Marissa

Moonliterider

Jack's Sweetie

Sorry, but I won't really be answering your reviews directly anymore to save space, but I truly appreciate your opinions! Thanks again! Don't forget all you old and new readers to Read and Review!

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	4. III: Into the Labyrinth

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's it folks!

Author's Notes: Thank you all who have reviewed the story so far! I'm very surpirsed by how popular this story is so far and it's only at the begining! Your reviews are very inpirational for me to continue! So please continue to read and review. I'd like to thank my super duper helpers, Marissa and SexySaiyanSakura, since without them, this story would not be as good as it is. This story is also dedicated to my friend, Marissa, whose love for Oogie is stronger than anyone else I know! Yay! On with chapter 3!

* * *

Chapter Three: Into the Labyrinth 

Back at the laboratory, Jewel heard a knock at the door and went over to answer it, wondering who it could be since they hardly had unexpected visitors. When she opened the door, she saw the two witches standing there. "Sorry to bother you Jewel." The taller witch spoke first in a polite tone.

"We just wanted to come here to tell Molly that we're closing the shop for the day tomorrow so she doesn't have to come in for work." The shorter witch informed.

Jewel looked a little confused, "Well, why didn't you tell Molly this yourselves when she went to your shop?"

The witches looked to each other, since now they were the ones confused. "What do you mean?" the shorter witch asked curiously.

"We haven't seen Molly since this afternoon." Added the taller witch.

"That's strange; she told me that she was running an errand for Finkelstein and that she would go to your shop then come strait home."

The witches shrugged their shoulders and said in unison, "Nope, haven't seen her all night."

Jewel thought for a while as she scratched her chin until she finally got an idea. "Oh no! This could only mean one thing…SOMEONE KIDNAPPED MOLLY ON THE WAY THERE!"

The witches gasped at the thought. But then they remembered Molly's reputation and the taller witch asked, "Are you sure she was kidnapped? Maybe she just wanted to get out of the house?"

"Oh my, maybe so…" Jewel seemed a little more thoughtful, as she recalled her daughter coming up with such lies to get out of the house. "Perhaps I just let my imagination get the best of me. I'm sure she'll come back before it gets too late then."

The witches laughed light heartedly, "Yes, I'm sure she's enjoying a nice walk at this very moment." The shorter witch said.

* * *

Although that wasn't the case, since Molly was really in the casino lair of the assumed to be dead Oogie Boogie, and was facing the burlap sack horror at the moment. Oogie began to laugh deeply while Molly continued to stare up at him, not knowing what to make of his last statement about her never leaving. Once she found her voice, she narrowed her eyes, not liking to be told what she was going to do by a total stranger. "Just who do you think you are telling me I can't leave if I don't want to?" 

The feisty question made Oogie laugh more, "Bwahahaha! Who am I? Oh that's good! Seems you are either oblivious or just plain stupid to not know me! I'm the Oogie Boogie man!" He then folded his arms over his chest and closed his eyes in pride.

A soft gasp escaped Molly after Oogie revealed his identity, "Y-you're Oogie? But father said you were dead!"

"So you have heard of me?" his grin widened as he studied her expression, which was still a look of surprise. "I can see you're quite intimidated." The rag doll then began to tremble and looked down at her feet. "Don't worry…" he said in a soft, yet not so reassuring tone, "I'll make sure that you won't be harmed, as long as you stay on my good side." Then he could have sworn he heard her chuckle, and raised a brow. "Hmm?" After awhile, the soft chuckles got louder, until Molly was suddenly laughing, and hard! "What are you laughing about!" demanded the Boogie man as he gave her a cross look.

Trying to control her fit of laughter, Molly replied, "Y-you….you….hahaha! You're telling me **_you're_** the boogie man! Oh my….hahaha! But you're just an over grown sack!"

Empty sockets widened for a moment before they narrowed, "WHAT!" Oogie was taken aback that someone dared to laugh at his appearance! It was inconceivable! Unheard of! Downright unacceptable! "I'll have you know that this 'over grown sack' as you put it, is the meanest guy around!" Poking her shoulder, with enough strength that would push her back against the wall a few times and warned her, "And if I were you, I'd watch what I say, because this might be the last time you see the Boogie Man!"

Molly really knew that she should not say anything to provoke Oogie, but she just could not help but to add, "And if I were you, I'd lay off the fattening foods, you look like you are going to rip apart at the seams!" Again, this made the once thought of as fierce giant neon green burlap bully widen his eyes and now his bottom jaw dropped in utter shock. It really didn't help that this also caused Molly to laugh harder than she was before.

"H-how…" Oogie stammered, knowing that he already lost his notoriously short temper, and was getting even more outraged by the feminine yet mocking laughter of the rag doll. Nobody ever got away with even implying that he was fat. **_Nobody_**! "How dare you! I'll have you know that I retain water beetles!"

A soft chuckle came from the raven haired rag doll, "You sure that's all you're retaining? Because it's a little obvious that you're no Jack Skellington!"

That was the last straw for Oogie, it was bad enough that she insulted his appearance, but when she compared him to Jack, the skeleton man he hated, was where he drew the line. He suddenly grabbed Molly by the arm before throwing her unceremoniously over his shoulder. "Back to Plan A!" he stated more to himself than to Molly as he began to walk, carrying Molly over his shoulder, keeping his arm wrapped around her lower back to make sure she didn't fall.

Molly was a little shocked by his reaction, since nobody ever thrown her over their shoulder in such a barbaric like way in her life. "Hey! Put me down this instant you brute! What do you mean by Plan A!" She squirmed around under his surprisingly strong grip.

Oogie ignored her demands and questions, though when she began to kick her legs around, she almost kicked his face so he had to put his other arm over them to keep them still. This rag doll took more effort to contain than he expected. Sally had been quite a push over when she tried to match wits with him, but Molly wasn't as submissive it seemed. As she continued to struggle, the burlap sack man sighed and rested his head to the side, finding that his head was not resting on his shoulder, but on something cushiony. This caught his attention "What's this?" he asked himself quizzically and stopped walking. As he looked to the side and realized that he had rested his head upon Molly's leather clad posterior. He couldn't help the grin that began to grow over his face before he rested his head against this newly discovered pillow. Oogie let out a soft contented sigh as he closed his eyes for a moment and said to his captive that he was leaning on. "You make a lovely pillow, **_Doll Face_**."

After Molly felt the weight of his head upon her backside, she stopped struggling for the time being and tensed up. "I know you did not just call me Doll Face!" she seethed trying her best to hide her embarrassment and sound more in control of the situation. "You better take your head off of my butt before I make sure you become the Headless Boogie man!"

"Dealing with you has made me a little tired, and you make an excellent pillow." Oogie replied in a half awake tone. He really didn't get much sleep since he didn't exactly own a comfortable bed, and considering he was about the equivalent of a bed. Even standing up, he could feel himself nodding off to sleep.

Molly realized that he was starting to fall asleep and decided to give him a rude awakening that she wasn't going to let him use any part of her body as a pillow. Once again she began to struggle, but this time it was more violent to wake up Oogie and in hopes that he would let go in his surprise.

Indeed he was surprised, but he kept his grip around her waist, and wasn't very happy about what she done. "Play nice!" he warned her turning his head to face her so she could see his glare. "If you keep acting like a misbehaving little girl I might have to spank you!"

"And I'm sure you don't want me to take a pair of scissors to you!" Molly threatened back, looking him right in the eyes to show how his warning did not faze her.

That really wasn't something Oogie would have liked and he tried not to think about it. "No. So it's a good thing you can't move!" he chuckled a little to cover how horrible the thought was of dying by scissors was to him. He then added, "I can assure you that you'll be a little preoccupied with what I have planned for you to keep you from thinking about taking scissors to me." Oogie then gave an evil laugh and continued to walk towards his planned destination.

Oogie's comment didn't make Molly feel any more confident, and she hated it when she lost her cool. She had never been in such a position like this, but she had been in a few tight spots and she wasn't about to let some sack man make her feel any more vulnerable. "What are you talking about? Where are we going!" When he continued to ignore her, she growled and shouted, "You better answer me you **_fat sack of bugs_**!" She then felt a sharp slap upon her backside, though the blow had been reduced a little by the leather material of her dress, but she still felt it.

"That's no way to get an answer." The Boogie man finally responded after giving her the slap on the rear. Then he added with a croon to annoy her, "You didn't even say please."

After Oogie gave her the swat, he had used his arm that held down her legs so Molly took this opportunity to kick the Boogie man right in the face with her heel. "I DON'T HAVE TO SAY PLEASE TO A JERK LIKE YOU!" this in turn, earned her another swat for her bottom that was harder than the first.

Oogie glared at the daring rag doll woman for that painful assault to his face, and was grateful that he had no nose that she could have broken. "Guess that means I won't let you leave." He commented before he placed her down and shoved her into an elevator contraption that was a few rooms away from the Torture Chamber. He then pulled the lever and the chains to the elevator began to clang together making a loud slightly rusty metallic sound as it began to move downward.

"Like you would have let me go before!" Molly yelled up at him with a heated glare as she shook her fist at him. She knew better than to try and escape a moving elevator, especially when her green eyes couldn't detect how far the drop was to the ground below.

A chuckle escaped the giant glowing green villain, "Hehehe…Nope." Waving down at her as he watched the elevator take Molly down further into the darkness below. "I hope you'll behave a little better for my…pet down there…HAHAHAHA!" He laughed loudly before he added, "If you can escape the Labyrinth alive, maybe I'll consider letting you go. I'm sure you're…**_dying_** for that! BAWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

* * *

Lock, Shock, and Barrel had been watching from the back entrance of the Torture Chamber through the bars of a window high above in their own bird cage elevator with wide eyes and open mouths. "I can't believe she called him fat!" Lock stated as the echos of Oogie's laughter could be heard clearly outside of the tree house. 

"I can't believe Oogie hasn't strangled her himself yet!" Shock added.

Barrel then said, "Molly's never going to escape the Labyrinth! Even if she does, Oogie's pet's gonna get her anyways! Can't we do something!"

Lock shrugged, but Shock actually tried to think. Then, it suddenly hit her. "I've got it!" This exclamation caused the boys to look at her with their full attention. After all, it wasn't like they wanted Molly to get killed. "Oogie's never really had a…**_lady friend_**…has he?"

Lock and Barrel looked to each other with identical mischievous grins. "No…he hasn't…" the two boys said in cynical unison.

Shock's mind reeled as ideas came to her and rubbed her small juvenile hands together with a wicked grin of her own. "Perhaps we should remind him of that." This caused the children to laugh in their own unique way as they made their elevator go up so they could go back up to their play room to gather a few thoughts about what they would say to Oogie quickly before they went to Molly's rescue.

* * *

The raven haired doll opened the door to the cage elevator once it came to a complete stop. As she stepped out, she cautiously looked around, her eyes still adjusting to the darkness. Suddenly the whirring of machines began to sound all around her and before she knew it, the darkness fled with the sudden appearance of neon colors all around her. The light blinded Molly for a few seconds and she had to rub her eyes a few times before she could adjust back to the light. Once she opened her eyes again, she saw bright blues and greens, even a few pinks all around the high walls of the maze like area she found herself in. 

"What's the matter, Doll Face?" Oogie questioned as he watched her from the hole that lead down to the Labyrinth, having a great view of it. "A little lost? I thought you would be, so I made sure to light the way for you, so to speak! Bwahahahaha!" Glaring up at the hole where the elevator came down from, Molly saw Oogie's smug green face, and again, he waved down at her mockingly. "You better hurry up, before something unpleasant comes and finds you."

Molly rolled her eyes and muttered, "Something unpleasant put me down here to begin with." Breathing in and out, she then began to walk down the one way hall that would soon lead her to three other ways she could choose from, in her challenging journey through Oogie's Labyrinth.

Oogie then decided to add, "Oh by the way Molly dear, since you are after all a defenseless little rag doll, I've been nice enough to provide you some of my Oogie toys. I'm sure you've always wanted to go out with a bang! AHAHAHAHA!"

"Aren't you a little too...BIG...to be playing with toys?" Molly yelled so that the burlap sack man who was watching her could hear her question. The ground then began to shake and a loud cry from a creature she could not identify echoed through the entire maze. Her eyes widened and she could hear Oogie laughing at her, not really needing to see her face to know that she was somewhat unerved.

"If I were you I'd get a move on, before the cries get louder!" Oogie suggested and wrapped his arms around his now sore stomach as he continued his devious laughter.

Deciding to not reply to him and let the Boogie man have the last word this time, Molly began to take the path to the right, since of course, right was always the right choice, at least that was the only good reason she had for taking it. Not knowing if this was the right way made her feel annoyed and anxious, and if she didn't know any better, she could have sworn the walls were closing in on her. Molly had no history of being Claustrophobic, but soon the walls around her really did seem like they were getting more narrow with each step she took. Just when she thought she had gone completely insane, she realized that the walls really were actually closing in around her from up ahead. Turning around she began to run back to where she started from and the walls started to clash together faster in order to catch up to her. Molly had to run and jump out so she could escape the trap and almost didn't make it back to where she had started when the walls closed off the right path. Sighing in frustration, after she landed hard on the ground, creating a small cloud of dust around her that had been lying still upon the ground, a soft chuckle of the sadistic spectator above her could be heard echoing all around her. 'Stay calm...stay calm...' she thought as she stood up and brushed the dust off herself with a frown. 'Getting mad is just what he wants from you.'

"Might I make a suggestion to you?" asked the glowing green sack as he poked his head down the hole in an upsidedown position, since now he was laying on his back. The point on his head dangled down and swayed from side to side along with his head with a grin plastered on his face. "You might want to take the path to the left if you want to get to the end."

Molly glared up at him for a moment, not liking how entertained Oogie Boogie was. "To the left you say?" she replied, sounding thoughful. After making it seem like she was thinking it over, she then began to take the middle path.

Oogie giggled in delight, "Are you sure you want to take that path? After all, I have a much better view up here than you do down there."

"Thanks for pointing out the obvious for me." the rag doll replied in a voice dripping with sarcasum. "It's because you've got a better view of the Labyrinth why I decided to go down this path."

"But you'll be sooooooorry..." said the Boogie man in a soft sing-song voice. When Molly dismissed him with the wave of her hand, Oogie chuckled softly to himself. He was surprised by how much fun toying with the offending doll woman was. Perhaps it had been too long since the last time he really got to watch someone else's misery. Of course, something, or more like someones, had to come along and interupt his viewing pleasure when he felt something poking his massive middle. Reluctantly, he sat up and faced his three minions. Folding his arms over his chest, and narrowing his brows together with an annoyed glare and a slight pout, he replied irritably, "And what do you three want?"

"Nothing in particular Oogie." replied Shock innocently speaking up first with a somewhat knowing grin.

Lock then decided to speak after her, "We just wanted to see what you were laughin' about. Seeing as how you haven't looked this happy in a **_very_** long time."

"Is it because of Molly!" Barrel suddenly asked, lacking the subtle hinting that Lock and Shock were tyring to use.

Giving his pint-sized minions a look of suspicion, Oogie wondered what they were getting at. These were cunning little brats he was talking to, after all, they did work for him. "Why do you think that it's the rag doll that's put me in such a good mood, hmmm?" Oogie asked, directing the question more towards Barrel, putting the shortest boy on the spot.

"Uhhhhhh...well, you're laughing..." Barrel responded with a thoughtful look.

"So!" the Boogie man snapped defensively, "I laugh a lot!"

"Yes, but you haven't laughed this hard after we brought you back." Lock stated logically with a small smile that showed his sharp teeth.

Oogie tried to deny the fact that he was true, sensing that they were trying to make Molly more appealing so that she would live through the night. "Oh please, it's just fun to watch her run around like a little mouse in a maze. She's a lot more trouble than she's worth."

Before Boogie's boys could mention something else to their boss, an explosion boomed from below and a scream could be heard in the Labyrinth. Instantly Oogie peeked down the hole to see Molly running back to where she started the maze yet again, though this time she was more exausted and her the cloth skin was covered with soot. After coughing several times and taking a several moments to catch her breath, Molly glared up at Oogie's face and shouted, "THERE WERE BOOBIE TRAPS DOWN THAT PATH!"

The stitched lips of the Burlap sack man curled as he roared with laughter, "WAHAHAHAHAHA! I told you to take the path to the left!" He reminded her smugly. This caused the doll woman to glower at him more, and a frustrated growl escaped her, which only amused Oogie more. "You know, you look rather cute when you're angry Doll Face." he added to further anger her, and to his satisfaction, it worked. With one more furious stare, she then turned on her heel and headed down the path to the left, which was now her only other choice. Watching her leave until she was out of his sight, Oogie chuckled a little before he looked back to his henchmen, each of them giving him their own uniquely sly smile. "What is that look for?" he asked crossly, narrowing his eyes and turning his grin into a frown.

"Adimit it boss, you like having Molly around." Lock replied with his smile growing.

Barrel added, "It's not that surprising, after all, she's not like anyone else in Halloween Town!"

"Jack's had some real trouble keeping her from cleaning out the townspeople's pockets." Shock stated in a sly tone. "Nobody has beaten her at any card game. Don't think there's anyone that can."

The tone of Oogie's voice changed to a furious boom, "Oh I see exactly what you are getting at now!" He then stood up and began to advance towards the children, who immediatly began to back away from him with worried looks on their faces instead of the confident smiles they had moments ago. "You are trying to let Molly have a second chance. Well that's too bad! Oogie doesn't give second chances to those who mock him! So you can just forget about whatever is going through those pea sized brains of yours and get out of my sights before I really get angry!"

Lock, Shock, and Barrel knew better than to argue so they scampered off to go back to the treehouse above Oogie's lair, leaving their angry boss alone. "The nerve of those brats!" Oogie muttered to himself as he refolded his arms over his chest and continued to stare in the direction the children ran off in. "Trying to manipulate me into keeping their precious friend around! HA! The reason I had them bring her here to begin with was to despose of her so that she wouldn't distract them anymore." Then he thought, 'Though they did make a point...it has been too long since I've had a good laugh.' Placing his pointed hand under his chin, he began to rub the area with a thoughtful expression. 'Hmm...and if I do keep her around...if being the key word there...I might just be able to enjoy her misery a lot more.' Though he then remembered the insults Molly made against him earlier and narrowed his eyes again. 'Then again, she's got it coming to her!'

* * *

Meanwhile, back with Molly, she was making her way through the path and was looking around, on guard for anything that might jump out at her or for walls to close in, but nothing came. No walls caving in, no skelletons jumping right in front of her from a pile of bones lying on the ground. "Something doesn't feel right about this...it seems too easy." She said to herself, her soft voice echoing off the walls along with the taps of her boots upon the stone floor. Just before she began to relax a tiny bit, she heard a loud matalic bang comming from behind. Looking back with wide green eyes, Molly saw nothing but the seemingly endless path back to where Oogie placed her down into the Labyrinth. She stared back for a minute or two before she felt secure enough to move on, she heard the cry of the unknown thing again, and this time, it was a lot closer than before. She felt her artificial heart begin to beat faster against her chest, and the sounds of heavy falling footsteps comming up from behind her made her jump. Choosing flight over fight, she dashed down the path as fast as her feet could carry her, creating loud sharp click clack sounds that would surely alert the creature to her location. The footsteps from behind began to pick up the pace to try and match her own, most likely trying to catch up to her. No doubt it was the thing that made the terrifying sound. No doubt it would love to make her into it's midnight snack, and no doubt that Oogie was watching her somewhere above with that smug grin of his, enjoying how helpless she felt. 

Breathing through her mouth now as she continued to run away from the invisible foe, Molly couldn't think right, she had no plan of action if something went wrong. There was nothing else she could think about besides to keep running faster, though her legs began to ache, and her heart continued to beat more rapidly. Just when she was sure that whatever monster was after her would surely get her, she noticed that there was an end to the path and grinned. It was the exit, it had to be! She just knew it had to be the end! Molly wasn't about to give up now, not when she was so close to her escape. There was even a slight glint of light up ahead, and she was sure that it must have been the light from the rising sun, though she wasn't quite sure if it was early morning, but she also didn't know how long it had been since she began this escapade.

Once her whole body made it through the threshold of the exit, she used her heels to cease her flight and breathed a sigh of relief. Placing her hand over her chest, Molly attempted to calm herself and began to chuckle as she closed her eyes. "I did it." she muttered to herself repeditively with a smile. She then opened her eyes and looked around, realizing that she hadn't exited the Labyrinth just yet. Now she was in a very large room, luminated with candles on the high walls, dripping with wax, the candles being held by strange giant skelletons. Molly began to get that feeling that perhaps she shouldn't be smiling just yet, especially when she looked to the right and saw what had caught the light of the candles to created the hopeful light she saw. It was a giant spider web, with its maker right in the middle of it, which almost took up the whole web.

The rag doll thought about running for it, but there was no where for her to run except back, and she had a feeling that the beast that had been trying to hunt her down was just waiting for her outside of this chamber. 'Oogie! He must have known about the giant spider...so basically he doesn't want me to get out of here...not alive anyways.' Molly thought to herself with a sneer as she thought of the Boogie man that she hadn't known for long, but despised already. It didn't take long for the spider to lock it's large eight eyes with the two green ones she had and immited a horrible screech like growl. As Molly winced a little, she realized that the sound the spider made was the same one she had been hearing the whole time. So in reality, she had in fact gone right into the trap, instead of running from the danger like she thought she had been doing all along. Though that still didn't explain the footsteps she clearly heard before.

The spider jumped down from it's perch in it's own web and stood a good ten yards away from her, staring her down for a while, to see if she would try to run. Molly cautiously looked about the room for anything that might be of some help for her, but still managed to keep a good eye on her foe incase it decided to attack her when she dropped her guard. Just as she thought, the spider suddenly began to crawl with a fast pace towards her and Molly's reaction to it was quick enough so that she could get out of it's way. The spider slammed head first into a wall, and pretty hard, causing it to enter a dizzy spell for awhile just as the rag doll stumbled across something she could use. Looking down, she noticed a large axe, that was slightly rusted; evidence that whoever was using it, left it down here for awhile. Noticing that the spider was shaking off it's daze, Molly reached down to pick up the axe, realizing that it weighted more than it looked. Cursing her lack of strength she continued trying to lift up the axe until she finally managed to lift it up just a few feet off the ground. In that same moment though, the spider jumped into the air, attempting to slam it's full weight onto the rag doll.

Molly took a deep breath to calm herself before she threw the axe with all her strength at the spider, but since she had been too much in a hurry to attack, she forgot to aim and the axe missed the spider by a long shot. The rag doll was slammed to the ground from the heavy body slam given to her by the spider, and it didn't even give her the courtesy to get back up before it trapped her body between it's two pincers to bring her closer to it's sharp teeth. First it took a bite of her arm, clamping it's teeth down on her entire left arm and jerked it's head to the side, ripping the arm from the seams where it had been sewed on. Molly's stuffing, which was really just a bunch of dead autumn colored leaves, fell out and once the spider realized that it's prey had no meat he spit the appendage right out. This truely didn't make Molly happy so in her rage she gave one of the spider's largest eyes a good punch, causing the spider to screech and back off away from her.

Scooting back against the wall, Molly watched the spider shake it's head from side to side in pain as she frantically tried to think of how she could defeat a giant spider when she was unarmed, due to the fact that she couldn't refind the axe and now without her left arm. Things weren't looking good, and she had a bad feeling that Oogie was going to win after all, and that the saying, "curiousity killed the cat" would really be true. After a minute or so, the spider recovered from the eye punch and seemed to glower at Molly, now wanting revenge. Just as it began to advance towards her again, something was thrown into the chamber, causing both the spider and the now defenseless rag doll to look at what it was. What was thrown into the room was a pair of dice, which were larger than normal. Once they got between both the spider and Molly, the roll's result was snake eyes, and suddenly purple gas began to come out from the holes of the dice, filling the air around them. The spider swayed from side to side before finally falling on it's stomach in a dizzy haze; apparently knocked out. The gas also effected Molly too, who was trying not to breathe in the now contaminated air, but it still invaded her body despide her attempts. With a few coughs, she found her world darkening around her before she laied back against the wall again. The gas ceased escaping the dice not long after Molly fell unconcious and then entered the one who threw the dice, that had saved Molly from her fate with the spider.

Molly was not wrong when she heard footsteps behind her, for they were the footsteps of an annoyed Oogie Boogie, who had decided that he wouldn't feed her to the spider just yet, and was trying to catch up to her before she reached the end of the Labyrinth. Oogie was not effected by the gas, since he had no nose and made sure not to open his mouth to breath in the air and fall unconcious himself. The room was clouded in some of the purple smoke but he could see enough to make out where Molly was. Walking over to her with an annoyed look, he thought, 'She better be kissing my feet when she wakes up and realizes I spared her little life!' Then he noticed her missing arm and gave a mental sigh before he glanced around for her arm, which didn't take too long to find since it was only five feet away from the spider. Picking the rag doll up and throwing her over his shoulder carelessly like he had done before, he retreived her arm as well and began to walk back to the entrance of the Labyrinth.

* * *

Well well, what did you all think? Oogie and Molly get along great don't they? What will Molly think of Oogie when she wakes up and realizes that he helped her escape the spider? Though I don't think she's going to do any foot-kissing since Oogie was the one who put her down in the Labyrinth to begin with! 

I'd like to thank the following for their reivews:

SexySaiyanSakura

Quillian91

Moonliterider

Marissa

Jack's Sweetie

Kaitlynn

MasterShaper

NeoKairi

I hope I kept you all entertained throughout the chapter and that Oogie and the others seemed IC. Continue to read and review and I'll try to update with chapter 4 faster than I did with chapter 3. My school had finals the other week then I got into trouble and had to do some extra stuff around the house to occupy my time.

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	5. IV: Lucky Break

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's it folks!

Author's Note:

Thanks to everyone who is still reading this fic and all new readers! I must also state that this fic is dedicated for one of my super duper helpers, who has been helping me with my fic work since probably when I began to write, Marissa! To the biggest Oogie fan I know, this one's for you! And a special thanks to none other than SexySaiyanSakura! Without her help, I wouldn't have been able to finish THE longest chapter of this fic! And now for your reading pleasure, chapter 4 of The Nightmare After Christmas!

* * *

Chapter Four: Lucky Break

The next morning at Dr. Finkelstein's Lab, the doctor had pulled yet another all nighter on his experiments, not even noticing that the hours had flown by so quickly. Igor had gone off to bed a long time ago, so the paraplegic man continued on enjoying the silence. That was, until his wife came into the room shouting at the top of her lungs, "MOLLY'S RAN AWAY! OR WAS KIDNAPPED! SHE'S NOT HERE!"

Dr. Finkelstein flinched from the sudden intrusion and it took several moments for him to calm his nerves. "Try to calm down dear, she's probably went to work...or whatever it is she does."

"She has the day off!" Jewel informed with a suspcious tone, "And she left last night saying that she was running an errand for you but never returned! I bet she hasn't been home all night. ALL NIGHT! I bet she's out there getting herself into trouble again!"

"Oh it's just her rebelious stage darling, she'll get over it soon." the doctor replied in an almost carefree way. "She'll come back when she wants to."

Jewel didn't seem to listen and continued to spout out in her frustration and panic, "If she is not back home by this afternoon I'm sending out a search party!" She then stomped out of Dr. Finkelstein's lab and the doctor sighed then went back to his work, sure that nothing could possibly be wrong and that his wife was overreacting like always.

* * *

However, this time Jewel hadn't been completely paranoid, because Molly was still in the clutches of the Oogie Boogie man. She managed to escape becoming the giant spider's midnight snack due to a change of heart from Oogie, but was currenly still asleep from the knock out gas. It wasn't until the golden pumpkin sun began to shine in through the small barred window in the torture chamber when the rag doll's eyes fluttered open after feeling the warmth of the sun's rays. The rag doll was sleeping on her stomach and gave a soft yawn. Trying to wipe some of the sleep from her eyes, she then realized that her hands were tied behind her back, and her ankles were tied together. Once she was more awake, loud snores caught her attention, and Molly realized that something was laying on top of her lower back and burlap arms wrapped around her torso. Turning her head to look back, she lowered her eyelids in annoyance to find that a slumbering Oogie was laying on his side, using her as if she were his favorite pillow, snoring in his peaceful sleep. 

'That no good...ugh!' Molly thought in frustration, then noticed that the droopy point that was on his head was very close to her hand, she moved so that she could grasp it in her hand and added mentally, 'This ought to make him think twice about using me like a pillow again!' and with that thought, she yanked on the tip of his head in a quick, hard jerk.

This woke poor Oogie up, sitting up with a startled yelp, "Waaah!" Looking around he then noticed that Molly was awake, and had been the one who gave him such a rude awakening. "Oh. I see you're up now." he said to her with narrowed eyes before he sat down across from her with his stubby legs spread out in front of him and arms folded over his chest. He did not look pleased at the moment, as he got into a glaring contest with the rag doll for several minutes until he finally broke the silence. "So...you got something you wanna say to me?"

"Yeah..." Molly replied with a cross look, "...you snore."

Oogie narrowed his eyes more before he made the sound of a wrong answer buzzer, "Eeeeh. Wrong. Guess again."

"How about never use me as a pillow?" guessed Molly, narrowing her eyes more as well. "Or maybe untie me NOW?"

"No and NO!" Oogie responded, loosing his temper again. "Try saying, 'Thank you Oogie for rescuing me! I am forever in your debt!' or something close."

The rag doll laughed, "Oh yeah, thanks Oogie! I've always wanted to almost get eaten by a giant spider! Thanks for making my dream come true!"

The Boogie man stood up to make himself more intimidating to Molly, who was still tied up on the floor. "That may be true..." he said in a calmer tone before he pointed at her and added in a harsh way, "BUT I DIDN'T HAVE TO SEW BACK YOUR ARM!" With that, Oogie walked away into another room of his lair grumbling to himself after leaving Molly alone.

Molly rolled her green eyes at her retreating bully's back as she murmured, "Pft...yeah I'm sure you did..." But then she realized that her arm had been reatached. Looking to her left arm, she noticed a new set of stitches had been added around her shoulder, clear evidence that someone had to have sewn it back on. But why would Oogie do something that seemed...considerate? It didn't make sense, since they were not very friendly with each other.

Just when Molly began to ponder about how she was going to get out of the ropes, Lock, Shock, and Barrel suddenly came into the room and came over to her, squatting down to her eye level. "Wow, you're pretty lucky!" Barrel commented with a glad smile, since it seemed now that Oogie changed his mind.

"Rule one with Oogie: ..." began Lock as he took out a dangerously jagged knife that would make anyone who hadn't had their Tetanus shot shiver. Using the serrated side, he then began to saw away at the ropes binding Molly's ankles and wrists. "Never call him fat."

"He's a little sensitive about that, but he won't admit it." Barrel commented in a low whisper, afraid Oogie might have heard him if he spoke louder.

"Thanks..." Molly said in a sarcastic tone, "...you know I really like what you wanted to show me! Love it to bits! Especially when I got my arm ripped off by a giant spider!"

The children looked a little suprised as they looked to her arms, "Really? But your arms look fine now." Shock replied skeptically.

"Please, don't play dumb," Molly responded soon after Lock was done cutting the ropes around her ankles. She sat up so that he could cut the ropes on her wrists better. "I know one of you had to have been the ones to sew it back on. I mean, Oogie really couldn't have done it himself. I bet if he did it I'd have an arm coming out of my back!"

Lock finished cutting the rope binding her wrists before he informed her, "Wasn't us. We were up in our tree house after we sent you down the chute."

Molly looked a little skeptical, but she had a feeling that they were telling the truth. "And...Oogie's the only one down here...isn't he?"

All three of the tricksters nodded before Shock made a comment in a sly tone, "He must have sewn it back on himself...which means he must **_really like you_**..."

"Oh please!" the rag doll woman rolled her eyes as she rubbed her writs a little before folding her arms over her chest.

"Well it wouldn't hurt to be a little nicer to him..." Shock replied, not at all discouraged from continuing to persuade Molly. "At least thank him. Oogie would really appreciate that...and who knows...your stay here might be better."

Molly scoffed before commenting, "I'd rather take my chances with the spider again than go thank him!" She was still very angry over the whole idea of being held against her will. Then again, if she was a little nicer towards the oversized potato bag, perhaps she could convince him to let her go. It was worth a shot, she thought, as she stood up and began to look for Oogie in the direction he stopped off to.

Shock began to cackle in a diobolical way, while Lock's grin grew, but Barrel didn't look like he understood what was going on. "Uh...I don't get it. Why are we telling Oogie that she likes him, when she doesn't, and then, tell Molly that Oogie likes her, when he almost had her killed?" asked the shorter boy.

Turning to him sharply, Shock snapped, "Because, stupid! If they both get along better, Oogie wouldn't get so mad at us all the time!"

"And if Oogie focuses more on Molly instead of us..." Lock picked up where Shock left off. "...then maybe she can help him think up some new fun things for us to do instead of just sending us out to Town day after day!"

"B-but...don't they argue a little too much?" Barrel asked in an innocnent like tone.

The little witch shook her head, "No way! Some of the best couples argue like they do! Maybe even more!"

Barrel began to think about this, then suddenly realized the genius behind Shock's plot. "Oooh! I get it now! It's kinda like how you and Lock fight all the time!"

At this sudden realization, both the children Barrel mentioned smacked the boy dressed like a skelleton around and both cried out in anger, "NO! NOT LIKE US!"

* * *

The Boogie man had left the infuriating rag doll back in his Torture Chamber to go into one of his lesser known rooms; his Billiard Parlor. It was darker in this room than it was in the Torture Chamber, since this room had no windows to let in the golden rays of the morning pumpkin sun. Inside Oogie's Billiard Parlor, there was of course, a large Pool table, which had red felt instead of the usual green, so that in the dark, it glowed bright red. It was longer than the average pool table, which took up a large part of the room itself. All the balls were in the side and corner pockets because Oogie rarely played pool, since it was more fun to play against another person. So since Oogie didn't have visitors who made it past the Torture Chamber, the pool table became just a large felt covered table that he sometimes used to toss his dice upon. His white pair of dice were sitting upon the said table at the moment while Oogie was leaning against the side of the table with about five darts wrapped around in one hand while the other had another dart he was preparing to throw at his dart board. The dart board itself was a standard dart board, except for the fact that it was larger than a normal one, and in the middle was a sklleton replica of Jack Skellington, which already had a few darts stuck in its eyes sockets. 

Molly happened to walk into the room just in time to see Oogie throw his next dart right between the eyes of his target which was made to look like his rival. The doll took a step back from her momentary surprise, then took notice of the other darts stuck in the head of the fake Jack Skellington. 'Sheesh, Oogie must really hate Jack...' she thought before clearing her throat to hopefully catch his attention. "Nice shot there." she commented, trying to break the ice in a casual way.

Oogie turned to her immediatly after hearing her voice and wondered how she got free of the ropes, then he figured Lock, Shock and Barrel must have done it since he knew they were running about his lair. Still upset with her, he began to mutter to himself in a grumpy way before he continued with his darts game.

She watched as he threw another dart and thought to herself, 'Geez, touchy guy ain't he?' Taking a step forward, more towards him than in the range of his dart board, less he got mad enough at her and decided to put her in the fake Jack's place, she continued to think, 'I honestly don't want to thank him, but it won't hurt anything but my pride. And I can put that aside if it'll help me get out of here sooner.' Putting on a small smile, she began to rub the part of her shoulder where her arm was resewn together and said outloud, "You know, you did a pretty good job sewing my arm back; looks good as new, and feels that way too." Molly moved her arm a bit to show how strong the threads held her arm to her shoulder.

When she looked back at him to see his reaction, Oogie only shrugged casually, not even looking at her as he threw a few more darts.

Molly felt like stamping her foot on the ground since the burlap sack wasn't making this easy for her, and wondered if he knew that. Of course, Molly was up for a challange, and was determined not to let him get the best of her, after finding out what speaking her mind rewarded her with last night. "I guess what I'm trying to say is..." she began again with a shy looking smile as she looked off to the side to make it seem like she was having trouble with what she wanted to tell him. "...well...thank you." Molly finally forced herself to say without grimmacing. "You really didn't have to do that for me but you did it anyways. I think that's really..." she tried to force herself yet again not to make a sour face as she ended her statement, "...thoughtful of you."

Oogie had been trying to ignore her and focus on aming his dart so that he could hit his next desired mark, but after Molly said that what he did was thoughtful, he was caught off guard. The Boogie man never thought that the rag doll would thank him after the heated confrontation between them, and nobody had ever thanked him sincerely before. At the same time he had gone into this momentary state of thought and surprise, he had thrown the dart, which ended up missing the board entirely. A minute passed before he finally collected his wits again and responded, "...You're just saying that."

'Finally got his attention...' Molly thought to herself, glad that now he was finally talking to her, an odd feeling since she wished he'd leave her alone, yet now she was seeking him out. Of course, not because she wanted to spend time in his presence, but to gain her freedom. "It was hard for me to believe that you would do me a favor like that after how mean I was to you last night."

"Well I did!" the Boogie man snapped, slightly pouting as he threw another dart. "And you could have at least tried to be thankful!"

"That's why I came to find you..." Molly replied, still using her soft, very kind tone, "...to thank you." She began to rub her shoulder again and shifted her feet a bit to make it seem like she was still a bit shy around him after finding out that he helped her.

Oogie was still very suspicious of her intentions, taking notice of her drastic change in attitude. "Oh _just_ to thank **_me_**?" He asked her skeptically then narrowed his eyes as he made his loud voice boom with harsh accusation. "Why? Because you don't want me to throw you back down to play with my pet again?" Not waiting for Molly's reply he added in an authoritative tone in efforts to intimidate the rag doll, "Well you should be scared! I'm the Oogie Boogie man after all!"

But instead of being intimidated by him, Molly mentally rolled her eyes and thought to herself, 'What an ego...wonder if his is bigger than Jack's. Best not ask him though; last thing I need is to is make him mad again.' Luckily for her she didn't loose her wits as easily as Oogie did when caught off guard. "No, not just because of that, because it's polite to thank someone after they do something nice without having to."

A snort escaped the still skeptical Oogie, "You're jokin' Doll Face! Now you suddenly want to be polite?"

"Well being rude doesn't help anyone." Molly countered quickly.

"Helps my pet spider get dinner..." he replied in a soft devilsih way with an equally evil smirk.

Molly truely wanted to yell at the impossibly hard to get along with burlap foe, but she continued to try and stay calm, though now her voice held a bit of frustration in it as she told him, "Well I'm sorry I was rude before, but getting told that you're held captive against your will by someone you've never met doesn't put you in a good mood!"

"Yeah well...just remember who you're dealing with next time!" Oogie warned her after throwing his last dart then went to take the darts out of the board.

The rag doll took this time to take in the room a little better and noticed that a pair of dice was sitting on the pool table. "You roll dice a lot?" she asked in true curiousity as she took a few more steps towards the dice to inspect them better.

At this question, Oogie seemed to beam with pride as told her, "Why of course! No one in all of Halloween Town is better than the Boogie Man when it comes to dice!"

"Mind if I roll them a few times?" Molly asked as she picked one up, looking at the skull designs on it. "I've tried to make a pair of dice myself, but I just couldn't get the shape quite to my liking."

Molly's interest in his dice amused Oogie, and he began to think that perhaps now she knew just what kind of authority he had over her as her captor. "Hehe, knock yourself out Doll Face." he answered with a chuckle.

'I'd rather knock you out!' Molly thought to herself as she rolled the dice in her closed right hand before tossing them onto the felt pool table. The number that she rolled totaled to seven; three on one dice and four on the other. "Hmm...seven...is that good?" she asked as she looked back to notice the look of total shock that was on Oogie's face for a brief moment.

"Y-yeah..." the Boogie man then shook his head to get rid of the shock of her getting a good number while he always got snake eyes. "But it's just beginner's luck."

"Must be." Molly shrugged as she picked up the dice again, not helping the small smile as she rolled an eleven this time; one dice read six and the other five. "Now I got eleven. Is that good too?"

Now Oogie looked inceresingly frustrated that she got yet another good roll number. "Yes! Still just luck! So don't think you're hot stuff just yet!"

After she tossed another seven, with five on one and two on the other dice, she commented smugly, "Wow, I must be Lady Luck herself today."

"Well dice is nothin'!" growled the now irritable burlap sack man, "I am the master of **_all_** games!"

"Oh really?" the rag doll placed her hand on her hip and leaned that hip to the side as she raised her brow to question him.

Instead of getting mad at her silent questioning of his credintials, Oogie found her ignorance of his skills highly amusing and cute. With a smirk, he bowed dramatically, "Of course! I told you that there is no one in all of Halloween Town better than Oogie Boogie! BAWAHAHAHA!"

'Okay, I know your name already...' thought Molly as she lowered her eyelids to give him a dry look before she glanced back at the pool table. She knew how to play pool, but hadn't played in a long time, so she decided to challange him. "Wanna play a little pool to prove that then?"

This made Oogie chuckle again, "Why not? I'm feeling generous today, so I'll even let you start."

Molly picked up the hem of her dress and gave him a short curtsy, "Why thank you Boogie." She then began to take out all the balls from the side and corner pockets to help him set up the game.

* * *

The rag doll and the Boogie man played a regular game of pool, but they got along quite well for two people who got on each other's last nerves. Since Molly wasn't that skilled in pool, Oogie managed to win their first game of pool, causing Molly to want to play another. This went on until Oogie won five times in a row. After hitting the black eight ball into the left corner pocket with a grin, he gloated. "Looks like you're not Lady Luck after all. Hahahahaha!" 

Although he had been laughing at her after each time she made a bad move, hit his ball into one of the pockets on accident, and after she would lose, Molly was actually enjoying the pool games. She chuckled and admitted to him in a light hearted tone, "Okay you've got me beat in pool, but that doesn't prove that you're the master of all games. After all, I was good with the dice before."

"So you think you can beat me at something else?" Oogie asked, not able to hide his interest in whatever it was she had in mind to challange him to next. Usually he would have to spend his time throwing around a pair of dice that would always show him snake eyes when he wasn't plotting ways to get back at Jack. Playing and winning against Molly was very enjoyable for him, and he was glad that he had descided against letting his spider kill her. 'I could get use to this...' he thought to himself with a smile.

Molly hopped up to sit on the edge of the pool table close to where Oogie was standing and replied, "Oh I don't think..." getting closer into his face she added softly, "**_I know_**!"

"And just what game might you be so good at?" he asked her with his amused grin growing more at her confidence.

"Ever heard of a little game called Bat Snot?" she questioned with a raised brow, still close to his face.

"HA!" Oogie then threw his head back laughing harder, "Hahahahaha! I might as well invented the game!"

Molly couldn't help the practically evil smirk that made it's way upon her lips as she bragged, "There's nobody in Halloween Town that can beat me."

"Ooooh-ho! How sweet!" the burlap sack man crooned as he rubbed his pointed hands together diabolically. "Well Doll Face, no one in Halloween Town may be able to defeat you, but someone outside of it can. Care to play a game to prove it?"

A stitched hand disapeared into her dress pocket and withdrew her deck of cards slowly, then suddenly opening them out in a fan like display with her smirk growing. "Already ahead of ya, Boogie. But let's make things interesting. I feel like a little gamble."

Molly had just said the magic words to Oogie to keep him amused, "Oh? And just what have you got to bet with, Rag Doll?"

"Well..." Molly pretended to be thoughtful as she looked away for a moment then replied, "If I can win the best two out of three games, maybe you could...oh I dunno...lemme go?"

At this proposal, the Boogie Man looked intrigued, "And if you lose? That's a big bet right there, you must be willing to bet something equally big as well?" Just what was it that she would bet for her freedom? Oogie's mind reeled with many ideas at what it could be, and all of those ideas made his grin grow all the more.

Molly began to look away from him, still pretending to be shy and thoughtful before she answered him, "Well...what would you want me to do for you if you won?"

'Hmmmm she's giving me the choice...I like the way she thinks.' Oogie thought to himself as he took on a very thoughtful apperance; scratching his chin with his pointed hand. Not really paying attention, he thought to himself out loud, "Stop arguing with me for one..."

The rag doll woman had been leaning on the edge of the table waiting for his responce and was surprised at the quite simple prize. "Really? Is that all? Doesn't sound very big to me."

Oogie gave a little jump after being caught off guard, since it was not his intention for her to hear his thoughts. "Yes well...considering how much you argue it is!" Molly began to giggle at the look on his face, and covered her mouth to try to stiffle them but it didn't help much. With a cross look on his face now, Oogie placed his hands on his sides and spoke in the intimidating tone again, "Just for that, I'm uping the stakes! You win you get your freedom; I win, you have to do whatever I ask! **_Forever_**!"

Once Oogie announced this, Molly stopped her giggling and took on a more serious apperance. "Sounds good to me Boogie. You sure that's what you want though?" she asked with a grin.

"YES!" shouted Oogie with a glare, causing Molly to chuckle a little as she shuffled the cards a bit then began to deal them out to her and Oogie. As she dealed the cards out, Oogie growled a little out of annoyance from being teased.

* * *

"Yes, hahahaha!" Oogie laughed as he began to gloat after beating Molly in the first game of Bat Snot. "Can't say I didn't warn ya, Dolly!" 

Molly did not try to hide how upset she was at losing the first game as she thought with bared teeth, 'Darn it! I can't beleive this! Nobody's ever beaten me at this game! Not even once!' Looking back at Oogie she spoke out loud, "You still have to win one more time in order to make me do whatever you want..." then added with distasteful thought, '...forever! Ugh, I better start to cheat a little if I want to keep my dignity!'

"You should just save yourself the time and give up!" chuckled Oogie.

"Oh but what fun would that be?" Molly grinned as she shuffled the cards again to deal them out for the new game.

Oogie nodded in agreement, "Ah yes...good point Doll Face."

Time passed by as they played their second game of Bat Snot and Molly managed to cheat several times without Oogie Boogie noticing by pretending to scratch an itch between her fabric skin and where her boot was, where she kept a card that would help her with her next move. However, Molly's luck ran out when she reached down into her boot, once again pretending to scratch an itch to pick out another helpful card. Oogie had decided to look away from his cards to try and get a peek at Molly's leg, hiding his smile behind his cards, but it changed to a frown when he noticed what she was doing. Grabbing her arm and pulling her closer to him, Oogie plucked the card from her hand and inspected it with narrowed eyes. "What do we have here? A cheat!"

A frightened gasp escaped Molly as her emerald eyes met with his intensely furious empty sockets after getting caught. She gulped and tried to shake off her look of alarm to replace it with an innocent look as she answered, "N-no! I was going to play that card when I got an itch!"

Oogie's glare became meaner as he yelled at her, "I am no fool! The deal is off!" He then threw her arm away from him and stood up, since he had been sitting on the ground while she had been sitting on the edge of the table.

"W-wait!" Molly cried out in desperation, trying to think of a reason to make him change his mind as fast as she could. "I haven't been cheating the whole time! Honest! It was just right now that I was! I won't cheat again! Please?"

The Boogie man turned back to glare at her, but he secretly enjoyed playing Bat Snot with her too much to want to quit so suddenly. Besides, it would be much more fun to beat her at her own game, and she was practically begging him not to cancel their deal. "Fine!" he finally replied and sat back down, "But if I catch you cheating again, there will be no third chance!"

"You don't even trust me?" asked Molly with a sad frown to try and make Oogie feel a little guilty.

Oogie sneered, "I trust that given the chance you would take a pair of scissors to me!"

With a sigh, Molly pulled up the hem of her dress up to her knees and began to untie her bootlaces, catching Oogie's full attention. The giant, glowing green burlap sack man could not help himself as he stared at her now exposed legs with a letcherous grin. After she removed her boots from her dainty Barbie feet, she ran her hands over her stitched legs and explained her actions to him without looking at him, so she missed Oogie staring of great interest in her legs. "Here, I'll keep my boots off for the rest of the games and just to make sure I don't pull out any more cards, I'll keep my dress up to my knees. Happy?"

Her words were barely processed by Oogie's brain and it took him a few moments before he nodded his head dumbly in responce as he thought, 'Hehehe...I'm very happy with this! Once I win, I'll have to make her cut off some of her dress! I could get really use to this everday. Wahahaha!'

The unsuspecting rag doll woman placed down a card that was from her hand to end her turn, "Your turn Boogie..." she said with a sigh. Suddenly she noticed that it took the Boogie man a little longer to respond to what she said as he put down a few cards of his own, looking like he snapped out of a trance. 'Hmmm...I wonder...' Molly thought to herself as she moved her legs so that they would no longer be hanging off the side of the pool table and would rest to the side, with one leg over the other; now sitting more on her hip and using her arm to brace her weight. She then placed down her cards for her turn then looked up to see Oogie's reaction.

Oogie had indeed noticed her movement and placed down his card, obviously distracted by something as he thought, 'Oogie likes what he sees...hehehe!'

While he was distracted, Molly slowly removed another helpful card from her bodice then placed down her remaining cards in her hand, "Ooh lookie here! I won!" she announced with a pleased grin.

At this news, Oogie shook his head in disbelief, "W-what! No way! You cheated!" Then a thought came to him, "But wait..." he trailed off and thought, 'I was looking at her legs the whole time, so she couldn't have a chance to cheat. Uh...best not tell her that!' Shaking his head again, he finally concluded, "Nevermind..." then he admitted with an angry frown, "Fine. You win."

A giggle came from the rag doll as she patted him on the shoulder to act like a good sport, "Don't worry Oogie, we still have one more game left."

As she took the cards and shuffled them a third time, Oogie began to grin again, "Yes..." he said softly, "...yes we do."

Just to test out her theory again, Molly stretched her legs out, suddenly acting like she were fidgety, "Oh so exciting! I feel like I just can't sit still!"

Oogie swallowed hard as he stared at her legs again while trying to fight off the familure feeling of the pesky fireflies that were inside of him from glowing around his cheeks that would give away his embarrassment by making his cheeks glow a faint neon pink in the dark against the glowing green fabric.

'I KNEW IT! HE IS STARING AT MY LEGS!' Molly yelled mentally, feeling embarrassed herself, yet slightly flattered for some odd reason. 'I should cover my legs immediatly, but his little leg fettish might just help me gain my freedom! So I'll just let that lecherous, sack of bugs stare at them for a little while longer.' she decided as she then laid on her side on the pool table after dealing the new set of cards to start their third game. Moving her legs so that her left one was laying down and the other was propped up so that her knee faced the ceiling, she asked with a fake yawn, "You don't mind if I lay down for a bit, do you Boogie? I am feeling kinda tired."

He shook his head and tried to act like he didn't care, "Do whatever you want." Molly couldn't help but chuckle as she noticed how hard he tried not to stare at her legs too much.

Ten minutes later, with several more distrations and helpful cards from her bodice, Molly won the last Bat Snot, and felt relieved that she could now leave Oogie's lair and never have to see him again. "Well, it seems I won!" she said happily after sliding off the pool table, her dress covering her legs again as she picked up her cards and put them back into her pocket and plucked her boots off the floor. Walking away to the exit of the room she added over her shoulder, "No need to see me out; I'll ask Lock, Shock, or Barrel where the exit is. Later Boogie baby!" A smug grin was on her face as she waved back at him.

The Boogie man was not at all pleased by this, and wasn't about to allow Molly to leave so easily. Growling as he stood back up and managed to get between her and the exit, he responded in a strict tone, "Not so fast, Doll Face! You cheated! I know you had to have!"

Molly didn't have enough time to stop herself from walking into Oogie's massive belly, and took a step back to look up into his glowering face. "What do you mean I cheated!" She demanded with a defensive frown, "How could I have!" Though she really did cheat, she wasn't about to admit that to the Boogie man, not when he couldn't prove it.

He just glared more and replied, "I just know so. The bet is off now!"

"Hey!" the rag doll shouted, not caring anymore about the way she talked to him. "That's not fair! I won, so I get to leave!" She tried to get past him but he made sure that she didn't get an inch past him.

"I'm the Oogie Boogie man! OF COURSE I'M NOT FAIR!" he bellowed.

"But you can't prove that I was cheating!" Molly seethed as she returned his glare.

Oogie folded his arms over his chest and said in a final decision making tone, "It doesn't matter, because you-are-not-leaving!"

Fed up with Oogie's stubborness, Molly actually managed to push him aside enough to get past him out of the Billiard Parlor. "I won fair and square, so I-AM-LEAVING!" she shouted with a strong tone of her own.

Furious with her actions, Oogie growled, "Rarrr!" then quickly grabbed Molly around her waist with one arm and pulled her back, causing her to drop her boots from the sudden jerk and he was pleased when she gasped in surprise. With her back facing him, he kept a firm grip around her slim waist and pointed his free hand in her face to warn her against struggling. "No! You're NOT!" he yelled, his voice echoing off the walls in the room. "And if you keep trying to leave I'll toss you back into the Labyrinth with the spider!"

Molly's chest rose and fell dramatically as she took short but quick breaths in and out, trying to keep her cool in the situation she was now in. The last thing she wanted was for Oogie to throw her back into the Labyrinth and back with the spider, who might want to take more than her arm this time. She desperatly wanted to break free of his rough grasp, but knew better than to struggle from experience. The two minutes of silence that passed between them seemed like an eternity while Molly tried to calm herself and Oogie continued to hold her close to him in his tight grip. When she did look back at his leering face, her own held a doe like apperance with big, pleading green eyes. She blinked once before she asked in a soft, meek voice, "Please...let me go back home Boogie. Please?"

"No! Forget it!" he shouted, trying to crush all her hopes that he might change his mind. His decision was firm; she was his captive and she would not leave until he truely wanted her to leave. The fun was just getting started, and though the Boogie man would never want to admit it, he got lonely and it was nice to push around someone else who had the same interests that he did, especially when that person happened to be a pretty rag doll woman with a nice pair of legs.

But this rag doll was not just a pretty face, and she would not lose hope that she could change the giant burlap sack's mind. "Common...please Oogie Boogie?" she asked, still using the timmid tone, not daring to raise her voice to him again just incase he lost his temper and decided to do something she'd regret. "I've got to go back home. My parents are probably wondering where I am and I've got a job too." Trying her luck, she turned her body in his grasp, making it so that now he held her close to him from the front. Her slimmer torso now leaning against his large middle, as she looked up into his eyes with a much better eye-to-eye contact than she had when he was holding her back to him. "It would mean a lot to me if you let me go back to Halloween Town."

For a moment, Oogie was thoughtful, but then shook his head and responded with a firm tone still, "No! You will stay here with me! So don't even try to change my mind because it's already made up!"

"If you want me to come back to see you again I will." Molly said softly to him as she reached up to bat at the tip of the point that hung behind his head with her fingertips.

"Yes, of course you would, with a pair of SCISSORS!" he yelled as he continued to glare, swatting her hand away to make her stop playing with the point of his head.

"No! Of course not with a pair of scissors!" Molly responded, looking appauled by his accusation.

"Then with Jack Skellington instead!" suggested Oogie as he glared more, tighting his grip to make Molly more uncomfortable.

"No!" she denied quickly as she squirmed a little from discomfort, "Just me with nobody else! Honest!" Looking away from him to try the shy tactic again, Molly added, "I wouldn't want to get rid of someone like you..."

An unflattering snort came from the larger burlap sack man, "Yeah, because everyone likes spending time with a fat sack of bugs who feeds his guests to his giant pet spider! Yes people are dying to come over and visit Oogie Boogie because he's fun to be around!"

"Well getting my arm ripped off by a spider and running around a Labyrinth wasn't fun but everything after that was!" Molly argued, and this time, she managed to catch Oogie off guard again. Not giving him any time to respond just yet, she added quickly, "I mean...nobody's EVER beaten me at Bat Snot. Not even once! But you did." Wiggling a little so that she could set her arm which had been resewn by him, and rested it softly against his own arm that held her captive. Looking deeper into his eyes making hers have the most sincere look, she continued to say, "And it made me desperate enough to think about cheating, and of course you caught me, something NOBODY'S ever done before...except you...Oogie."

Upon this bit of flattery, Oogie began to rethink his decision, looking more thoughtful than he did last time. "Well..." he trailed off before finally deciding, "...you would have to swear to come back!"

Molly nodded her head several times to show how seriously she took him, "Yes of course! I promise I'll come back to see you again as soon as possible!"

With a reluctant sigh, the Boogie man released Molly slowly and took a step back before he added sternly, "You better come back then Molly. If you don't you'll regret it!"

Suddenly the rag doll threw her arms around his neck in a friendly embrace, extremely happy that her luck was so great, and had she been just a tad more excited, she might have even left a small peck on his cheek, but Molly decided that such a thing might have gone too far, and that she would feel sick to her stomach after doing so. "Oh thank you Boogie!" she cried out happily, before giving his neck a little squeeze and then backed off, giving him a warm smile. "Trust me, if I don't come back I would regret it!" Picking up her boots again she took a few steps towards the exit of the room and looked back at Oogie one more time, "After all, I wouldn't want to lose my best Bat Snot playing buddy." With those last words said, she then left the room completely, heading back to find one or all of Boogie's Boys to show her the way out of Oogie's death trap lair.

Oogie Boogie watched her leave and continued to stare at where she once was until he shook his head, "Rrrr...she tricked me!" he said to himself, though he was grinning a little, which betrayed his irritated tone. A few minutes later, he heard the scurring of feet and saw Lock, Shock, and Barrel enter the Billiard Parlor with looks of alarm on their small faces. "Now what do you three want!" he asked in his usual grumpy tone, placing his arms on his sides and leaning down a little at them more to their level.

"Y-you let Molly go!" they all responded together, with wide eyes.

A deep sigh escaped the bag of bugs that was the three children's boss, "Yes, I let her go. And? Do you question my judgement!" Lock, Shock, and Barrel immediatly shook their heads to dissagree that they had any problems with his decision to let Molly return to Halloween Town. "Good!" He then added defensively, "She promised to come back, so it's not like I did anything nice for her!"

"Wanna bet?" Lock asked skeptically, not at all convinced that Molly would come back to see Oogie again. Not even he, or the other two children would want to come back to Oogie if they weren't so afraid of him.

"WHAT!" howled Oogie, losing his temper yet again with them, causing them all to flinch but Lock boldy explained his words still.

"Common Oogie, why would she wanna come back to see you?" for once, Lock liked being the one to put down the giant bully and added causally with a cruel grin, "Now that she's free again, she's probably not comming anywhere near you again."

Shock socked Lock as hard as she could to keep him from angering Oogie any more, but the damage had already been done. "SHUT UP LOCK!" she shreiked before looking back at the still glowering Boogie man and grinned sheepishly up at him. "Don't listen to Lock, boss! Of course she's going to come back."

"Really? Give me a good reason why she would..." Oogie spoke softly until he turned on Barrel and narrowed his eyes, "BARREL!"

Barrel was caught off guard and fell back from his great surprise. He gulped and began to say nervously as he thought really hard about his answer, and the fact that Oogie was glaring down at him and tapping his foot impatiently while Lock and Shock were staring at him didn't help either. "Um...well..." he looked up at Oogie to get some kind of help, but he continued to glare down at him, seeming bigger than he usually did. "Uh..."

Oogie Boogie was not a patient man, and he got more and more angry with Barrel as the small boy tried to think of something to say to him. "Rrrraaaaaaah!" The Boogie man roared and stomped his foot in frustration before shouting, "DON'T YOU BRATS HAVE SOME CANDY TO ROT YOUR TEETH WITH! GET OUT OF MY SIGHTS OR ELSE I'LL THROW YOU TO THE SPIDER!"

Even Lock knew better than to argue with Oogie after he lost his temper and threatened them. All three of the children ran as fast as they could out of the room to get away from their furious boss. After they reached the Torture Chamber, they all stopped to catch their breaths, which they lost from fright rather than exaustion from running. Once the little witch caught enough of her breath back, she then socked Lock's face again. "I CAN'T BELIELVE YOU! YOU...YOU...IDOT!" Before he could get up from the ground she dropped down and began to choke him with both hands wrapped around his neck, "HOW COULD YOU BE SO STUPID!"

Lock managed to push Shock off of him and once he got enough air back into his lungs he pointed to Barrel with an accusing finger. "HEY IT'S NOT ALL MY FAULT! WHY AREN'T YOU BELTING HIM FOR STADING AROUND ACTING LIKE A BIG DUFFUS!"

"Hey!" Barrel replied in his own defense, "I'd like to see **_you _**come up with something nice to say about Oogie Boogie!"

The three children continued to fuss loudly with each other and even started to beat up each other, which was quite normal, and happened on a daily basis. Oogie could hear everything they said since they were so loud and narrowed his eyes as he stomped over to collect the darts and began to throw them at his customized dart board again.

* * *

Molly finished retying her boots on the bridge that was on the other side of the tree house to travel through the grave yard to go back to Halloween Town. Once she was done she began to treck back home. "Ha! Will I come back! Ooooh don't you worry Boogie boy! I'm commin' back! Not with a pair of scissors, oh no! Those wouldn't get the job done like a double edge axe would! Or a sword for that matter! And you think I'll let **_Jack_** get rid of you? Oh no, no, no, no! I'm going to take care of you personally!" 

She noticed that it was already dark outisde as she continued her rant by muttering sadistic ways to get back at the difficult and stubborn Boogie Man, but it wasn't long until she ran into someone from Halloween Town; the loveable, yet very slow talking and moving, Behemoth, who usually tended the pumpkin patch, but was out in the graveyard for some odd reason. After bumping into him and realizing who it was, Molly gasped, "Behemoth! What are you doing out here?"

Behemoth teetered on his heels for a little while before regaining his ballance and stared at Molly for a few moments before replying in his deep, but slow tone of voice, "Everyone...wonder where...Molly went to. Mrs. Finkelstein...worried...about Molly. I look for Molly...all over pumpkin patch...I don't see Molly there. So I come look for...Molly here...I find Molly. Molly okay?"

"Y-yes I'm fine Behemoth." Molly responded quickly after getting over her momentary shock. "So I guess my mother did take notice that I wasn't around and got the whole town on some wild search party, eh?"

The giant that was clad in denim overalls and a hatchet lodged in his head nodded a few times slowly. "Where did Molly go?" he asked curiously.

Luckily for Molly, Behemoth was not the brightest fellow in Halloween Town, so she was able to make an easy excuse, even though it was obvious that she had been around Lock, Shock, and Barrel's treehouse. "Well..." she began to wonder if she should tell him about Oogie Boogie still being alive. After all, Jack had tried to get rid of him before, certainly there was a reason for that. And nobody in town seemed to want to remember him by editing his small part of their Halloween song out. Finally she responded, "I was just out for a walk this whole time and got a little lost."

"Ooooh..." Behemoth replied, then stated, "Molly should go back to lab to see Molly's parents...they worried..."

"I know Behemoth. I will!" the rag doll said kindly before she continued on her way back home, wondering why she had just lied about everything that had happened in the past day.

Perhaps it was because she didn't care to explain? Or maybe Behemoth wouldn't understand the seriousness of having Oogie Boogie around? Though the main reason, Molly was afraid of, was that she actually didn't want to tell anyone about what transpired between herself and the Boogie man. But why could that be? What she had told him was all an act to get him to let her leave...or was it all entirely an act? Quite frankly, the rag doll truely did have a wonderful time playng games with Oogie, even when she was losing. That giant burlap sack was a challanging opponent, something she was not use to. Molly thought of all these ideas and questions as she opened the gate to Dr. Finkelstein's Laboratory, then finally came to the realization that despite all of Oogie's bullying, she did make a promise to come back to his lair. Just as Jewel opened the door to the actual Laboratory Tower and began to scold Molly, the raven haired rag doll smiled to herself as she began to think of when she could see Oogie Boogie again.

* * *

Yep, this one was quite a long chapter indeed! Now the total number of pages to this story have reached 40! Wow! So whatcha think? Don't they just get along great! Haha, hope you enjoyed the chapter, it's stuffed with comedy, a bit of tension, and lots of the reviewers' favorite lecherous Oogie lines! 

I'd like to thank the following for their reviews since my last updation:

SexySaiyanSakura

Quillian91

Moonliterider

Queen Freaky

White-Angel

Hope you all enjoy this fic still! I try to update at least once a week! High School can be quite a handful, but it's worth it and I try to give myself enough time on the weekends to finish up chapters and when I'm bored in class, (like in Chemistry and Spanish 3-4) I think up of what to put int he next chappies! Don't forget to read and review your thoughts!

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	6. V: Dinner Date

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's it folks!

Author's Note: The information I have in this chapter about Oogie's past and Bug Day is fact from The Pumpkin King video game. Found out about it online off of Just look up Oogie Boogie and you can find it. Anyways...just wanted to say I didn't take credit for comming up with that...since I didn't...so..enjoy chapter five!

* * *

Chapter Five: Dinner Date

"Now you come strait back home after work young lady!" Jewel instructed in a stern tone to leave no room for argument as she placed her hands on her hips just as Molly walked to the door. "Last thing we need is for you to get...lost...again! Honestly dear, how could you have gotten lost! This town isn't that big!"

Jewel's daughter didn't seem to listen to what her mother was saying, but nodded her head, "Yes mother...I'll be back after work..." she replied in a dull tone. She then noticed a moth still flying about in the early morning, most likely trying to find a place to rest it's wings. The rag doll caught the moth gently in both hands and began to walk to the Witches' Shop. Molly didn't really want to go to work today, but then again, she never did. Though today she had a trick up her sleeve...or more accurate, in her hand.

The two witches greeted Molly when she entered their shop, "Oh Molly!" the shorter witch cried out, "What happened to you yesterday? The whole town was wondering where you were."

"Jewel was running about like a chicken with it's head cut off she was so worried." added the taller witch.

'Yeah I'm sure she was...' Molly thought dryly before she began to make herself cough into her closed hands. Once she coughed a few times, she said in a horse tone, "I just got lost the other night while walking and it took me all day to find my way back home, that's all." She then began to cough again.

"Oh you poor dear..." the Tall Witch said as she sympathetically patted the rag doll woman on the back. "You sound just dreadfully sick! Sure you didn't catch a nasty cold?"

Molly coughed harder this time, almost hard enough to make a person end up with one of their lungs on the floor. "Oh I'll be fine, just a little **_Moth_**itus..." she spoke in a soft, miserable tone of voice. When she coughed again into her closed hands, she opened them and the moth she caught after leaving the house began to flutter gracefully around above the three women's heads.

"Goodness! Mothitus?" the Short Witch cried, "I'm highly allergic to moths!"

The Taller witch managed to catch the moth into her hat and placed a shrivered, wort covered hand over it to keep the moth inside. "Molly dear, we'd appreciate your help a lot, but until you are over this Mothitus, I'm afraid we're going to have to ask you to miss work. Just until you're better of course."

"Of course, I understand..." Molly sighed before coughing more and leaving the store. Once the door was closed all the way behind her, Molly grinned and said under her breath, "Suckers..." Taking notice that several of the townspeople were starting to leave their homes and continue their preperations for Halloween, Molly began to walk with a faster pace out of the gate that lead towards the Cemetary. Placing her hands into one of her pockets and wiggling her fingers to make the contents inside make tiny clanking sounds that sounded similar to the jingle of coins, or something coin like, she thought out loud, "Wonder if he'll be expecting to see me so soon..."

* * *

"Here you go Betsy, eat up! I know you must be soooo hungry old girl!" Oogie crooned as he patted his giant spider's head just above the group of eight eyes. The giant spider was eating from a large bowl about the size of a wading pool that was filled with Snake and Spider stew that he had made the other day but didn't really eat. Oogie then left the Labyrinth on the bird cage elevator and once he got up to the top, he was just in time to see Lock standing there with a smug grin on his face. The little devil boy had been following him around all morning with that grin that was begging for Oogie to slap right off.

The redheaded boy asked innocently, "Molly come back yet?"

Oogie narrowed his empty eye sockets and replied irritably, "The answer is still the same as the last time you asked me that! NO!"

An evil little chuckle escaped the boy as he continued pestering the Boogie man, "I toldja that she wasn't comming back!"

"It hasn't even been a day!" Oogie replied defensively as he headed to the Torture Chamber, where with the press of a button, he could torture Lock to make him too tramatized to even speak for a long time. "And if it seems she won't return I'll just take her back by force!" he added in bitter declaration.

Lock didn't seem all that convinced, "Really? How you gonna do that?"

A pointed burlap hand was reaching out to a bat shaped button that would soon spring a surprise for the little demon boy, "Here...let me show you..." Oogie responded with a twisted grin.

Just before he was about to press the button, Shock and Barrel ran into the room, causing the Boogie man to pause and look at them. Both of them had excited looks on their faces, though Shock seemed to contain her excitement better than Barrel, who was jumping up and down. "OOGIE! OOGIE! YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BELIEVE IT!"

Oogie watched the small boy jumping up and down, moving his head along with him until he felt his neck feel a little sore from doing so. "What? And hold still or I'll nail your feet to the floor."

Barrel stopped jumping as Oogie wished, but he didn't seem as frightened by his threat as he normally would. Beaming up at him, he replied, "Common! We gotta show you something!"

"We think you'll really liiiiiike it..." Shock added with her sly grin.

"I bet I will..." Oogie replied dryly, but then sighed knowing that he might as well humor them. "Alright...show me..." The two children then began to leave the Torture Chamber and headed down to the Billiard Parlor. Oogie walked slowly behind them with Lock not too far behind. Oogie's expression was one of boredom, until he entered the parlor, and then his eyes widened in great surprise.

Molly was sitting on his pool table with a small smile on her lips as she chuckled lightly, "You know it's not nice to make a woman wait Oogie."

Shock and Barrel grinned up at Oogie as they noticed that their boss stood there with wide eyes, while Lock had a look of total disbelief. The little witch and the skelleton costumed boy took Lock's hands and lead him out of the room so the two could be alone. Oogie stood there for a while until he realized that she was waiting for his responce and shook off the look on his face. Clearing his throat he then finally said to her, "I see that you are back...so you must have taken my threat seriously...well...g-good."

Instead of trying to argue with him, she mearly hopped off the pool table and began to walk over to him with a smile still on her face. "Well yeah, of course I did! Why? You afraid I wasn't?" With a soft chuckle, she then reached into her pocket and was fishing for something unknown. "I brought something for you..."

'Oooh a present? For me?' Oogie wondered, and couldn't hide his curiousity that overtook his features as he asked, "Hm? What is it?" Then he remembered the threat she made the other day and gave her a suspicious look, "It's not scissors, is it?"

Molly shook her head with a smile still, and found what she was looking for but didn't reveal it just yet. "No...guess again!" she answered with a bit of a grin, suddenly feeling in a playful mood. It was odd, since she rarely showed excitement for something so simple as a guessing game.

Once she clarified that the contents of her pockets was not scissors, the Boogie man seemed even more curious than before. Placing his pointed hand near his mouth in wonder, he tried to think of what it could be. When he couldn't think of anything, he responded, "Just show me...I don't like guessing."

"Aww...but that's no fun..." Molly pouted slightly before she pleaded, "Come on! Guess one more time! Pleeeease?"

"Oh I don't know!" Oogie threw up his arms from frustration, "You got the whole town in that pocket of yours or what?"

Molly frowned as she put her hand on her hip, her attitude returning though her tone was light hearted. "Hey! Is that some kind of fat joke? If it is, I would like to state that you have no room to talk!" She then giggled in that soft womanly way she always had when she was teasing him.

"Feh! You're just lucky I fed Betsy just now..." the burlap sack man muttered as he folded his arms over his chest and pouting slightly himself.

"Betsy?" the rag doll woman repeated quizzically tilting her head to the side.

An menacing chuckle escaped Oogie, "Oh don't tell me you forgot about Betsy? Especially since the two of you got along so well last time you met down in the Labyrinth. I think she is really fond of you."

"Are you talking about that spider...?" Molly asked cautiously, and when Oogie nodded with a sinister smile, she began to laugh uncontrollably.

Upon hearing her laughter, Oogie Boogie of course, got defensive as narrowed his eyes and demanded, "What is it that you find so funny!"

A few chuckles escaped Molly before she could finally gain enough control over her laughter to ask him, "Y-you named your spider Betsy?"

When she continued to laugh at the fact, Oogie growled, "AND JUST WHAT IS SO FUNNY ABOUT THAT!"

"Hehe...n-nothing..." she replied now out of breath and holding her sides. As she wiped away a tear of laughter from the corner of her eye, Molly reminded him about their guessing game. "Hey! You never finished guessing what I brought for you! Come on Boogie, guess one more time!" Molly's pale face was aglow with an emotion she rarely showed. This giddy behavior was a new experience, one she didn't quite understand, but felt the need to indulge upon it.

Although Oogie didn't seem to want to indulge upon her behavior as he folded his arms over his chest and told her, "No!"

"Pleeese?" she pleaded with him again with big doe eyes, "Guess some more and we can play whatever game you want first."

Oogie looked thoughtful for a moment before he gave into her bargain, "Alright fine. Ummmm..." He began to think some more as he scratched his head, "...you have...some cards?"

"Hehehe...noooo..." she answered then said in a cheerful tone that was usually against her nature, "Those are in my other pocket! Guess again!"

"Ugh!" he sighed then asked in annoyance, "Just how many guesses are you going to give me? Uhhhh...you finally made a pair of dice?"

Molly's eyes widened for a moment and she took a tiny step back, making Oogie think for a moment that he guessed right. She muttered softly under her breath to herself, "He remembered what I told him..." in soft wonder. The rag doll was so use to her comments about her hobbies going unnoticed or waved off by her mother and father, that she had not been expecting the Boogie man of all people in the Halloween world to remember such a small thing she mentioned. Smiling even more now, she shook her head and told him, "Nope! But you're pretty close now!"

"GAH! THEN WHAT IS IT!" Oogie shouted in exasperation. At last, Molly removed her hand from her pocket and showed to him a thick coin like item. It was white, which glowed more in the lighting of the room, and sketched into the middle was a skull and a small number ten written on its forehead. "Oooh, what do we have here?" he asked intrigued, though he wasn't expecting an answer. He already knew upon first sight that it was clearly a poker chip.

Molly handed the curious glowing burlap man the poker chip, which he took almost instantly to examine more closely. "I make them whenever I'm bored at home." she stated, then added with a half hearted laugh, "So I've got tons of them back there. I-if you'd like I could bring them over next time I come to visit. They are just collecting dust in my room. Would be nice to actually use them."

Oogie grinned, liking this idea very much, "That would definitely make our games more interesting...especially since we no longer have your freedom to wager on."

The rag doll nodded in agreement then asked, "So what game would you like to play first?"

"Batsnot!" Oogie answered at once, and added quickly, "Cheat free this time too!"

"Hey!" she exclaimed offended, "I did not cheat..." adding softly under her breath so that he could not hear she admitted, "...much..."

A snort escaped him as Oogie commented, "Right and I wasn't looking at..." he then trailed off, catching himself before he admitted something himself.

"Looking at what?" Molly questioned with an innocent tone as she blinked naively, though she had a pretty good idea of what he was talking about.

Oogie shrugged, "My cards."

"Oh." Molly blinked innocently, though she secretly thought, 'Batsnot!' Casually walking back to take a seat on the pool table again, she commented casually, "Well if you really think I'll cheat again I guess I'll just take off my shoes and bare my legs again so you're convinced."

A wide grin spread across Oogie's face until he realized it and forced himself to look more seriously, "Ah..yes I think that is a good idea Doll Face."

'Of course you'd think that...' she thought to herself as she shuffled her cards and sighed, "So what are we going to bet with today? Playing for nothing gets old fast."

"Well I picked the game, so why don't you choose what we bet with." replied the Boogie man, "You're good with that."

"I've got pocket lint..." she suggested, then giggled at how silly it sounded.

Oogie chuckled too, "We need something more than that!" Then a thought occured to him and a wicked grin spread across his face as he laughed dark and deeply. "I believe those three pains in the neck left some of their candy. We could bet with that I'm sure they wouldn't mind." Molly nodded and he set off to find this candy he spoke of. "I'll be right back." he told her softly as he creeped out of the room.

As she waited, Molly decided to discard her boots and pull the hem of her dress back up to just below her knees before she laied down on the felt covered table. It didn't take too long for Oogie to return with a large sack of Lock, Shock, and Barrel's candy over his shoulder. Sitting up with a smile she then shuffled her cards one more time and asked, "Want me to deal, Boogie boy?"

"Be my guest Doll Face," he nodded and recieved the cards she delt to him, looking them over until she asked him something.

"Miss me?" she asked in a coy way as she batted her eyelashes at him.

"Oh if only I had a heart!" Oogie replied as he pointed to his chest and pretended to look like it was in pain, "It would have broken the moment you left. Hahahaha."

Molly then placed her hand over her chest and gasped then spoke in an overly sweet tone, "Aww...and if you were serious, I might say that I missed you too."

Oogie smirked and asked her, "Who said I wasn't serious?"

"Oh batsnot!" declared the rag doll as she waved off what he said. Of course neither of them seriously missed each other, right? Both of them were just teasing each other...or at least that's what they were trying to convince each other of.

The two began their game and placed down cards one at a time and soemtimes two at a time, and all the while Oogie tried not to stare at her legs too much, though it was pretty much in vain since Molly made sure to catch his attention once in awhile. Though unlike before, she didn't do it to distract him from noticing her cheating, because she didn't feel the need to cheat for her freedom. Even without cheating, Molly was still beating Oogie at Batsnot with six games to none. They were on their seventh game when she asked him, "How serious does Mothitus sound to you?"

"I don't know," Oogie replied with a shrug as he set his cards down, "why?"

"Just trying to figure out how many days of work I can get off because of it." Molly placed down another card just as she heard a soft chuckle from her card playing partner. She found herself laughing a little herself until she asked him, "Why are you laughing?"

Oogie chuckled a little more before he answered, "Playing sick to visit dear old me? I believe you were missing me much more than I missed you."

Molly wondered if that was so, but shook it off casually, "Not really. I'd rather be here than that boring job that keeps me busy. Jack and the Mayor don't want me to con the townspeople as much as I use to."

"You tricking townspeople? Sweet innocent little Molly the rag doll?" Questioned the Boogie man amused while placing down his cards. "I just can't imagine it."

Noticing that he was mocking her, the rag doll woman placed down her cards with a scowel, "You'd be surprised...especially since I just won." While the sack man realized that this was true and tried to figure out why he hadn't noticed her card hand shrinking, Molly added with a smug grin, "Don't worry, you can keep the candy, I don't have a liking for sweets."

"Neither do I..." began Oogie and before she could come back with an insult, he added quickly in a defensive manor, "...and don't you dare make any comments!" The raven haired doll chuckled after he glared. "What I really like is Snake and Spider stew."

"Really?" she suddenly asked with great interest. When Oogie nodded his head giving her a questioning look, Molly continued, "I like it too, even though I've only had it once."

Oogie blinked, "Why only once if you like it?"

"Well..." Molly sighed as she replied, "I don't exactly know how to cook, and nobody at home enjoys it much." Taking a look out into the room, she looked down the hall to see where the window in the Torture chamber was. It was already getting dark outside, and she hadn't noticed how long she and Oogie had been playing."Wow, it's night already..."

Taking notice that the next words that came from Molly would have been that she had to leave, Oogie tried to seem as casual as he could while he suggested, "Perhaps you should stay for dinner...before you leave. I plan on making some if you're interested."

Looking back at him with green eyes, Molly thought about the shrill voice of her mother when she'd scold her for comming home late. Though if she said she had to work late for some sort of reason, perhaps Jewel would understand and not seem suspicious. The fact was also that she didn't want to go home just yet, "Okay, I think I'll take you up on that offer. I've got some time to kill anyways."

* * *

After agreeing to have dinner with him, Oogie showed her to where he did his cooking and Molly followed as she entered his bland looking kitchen. It was the least decorated part of his lair, with a large pot, stove and a table that could seat six. "Need any help with getting certain ingredients together or something?" she asked him as he began to fill the large pot with water.

Once Oogie began a fire started at the bottom of the pot, he turned to her with a devilish smile as he bowed overdramatically, "Of course. That way you can do all the cooking next time you stay for dinner."

"Making the guest cook for the host," Molly replied as she rolled her eyes, "how polite you are."

"Of course Doll Face! I am nothing but polite. Or have you forgotten how we met?" Oogie responded before he pointed to a spice rack that was close by. "Grab the basil and crushed pepper."

Molly smiled as she walked over to retrieve the spices and answered Oogie's question, "Yes, I remember well. You pretty much told me do as you said or else."

Meanwhile Oogie walked over to a cage on the ground with snakes hissing and slithering around in it and chose three of the largest ones. "I think I said please when I did."

Molly walked over to him with the two spices in hand, "No, you didn't. I would have remembered that."

"Well I was polite enough to sew your arm back on after Betsy tore it off." he responded as he threw the snakes into the warm water and smiled when he heard the creatures hiss in pain as they were being cooked alive.

"Okay so you did one nice thing. Doesn't mean you're polite." she told him, then suddenly a burlap hand touched hers and she looked up at Oogie who was suddenly right in her face.

Oogie grinned in pleasure as her eyes widened, "Don't forget that I saved you too." he crooned before taking the spices from her and began to sprinkle some pepper into the beginings of the stew then threw in some basil.

After getting over being taken by surprise, Molly then placed her hand over her heart and sighed in a soft dreamy way, "Oh how could I forget that my brave hero?"

Despite the fact that she was mocking him, Oogie laughed because he found it highly amusing to be called a hero when really, he was not. "Just don't tell anyone about that. I wouldn't want to get a good reputation."

"Yes, wouldn't want the big bad old Boogie man to be thought of as nothing more than an overstuffed animal!" Molly chuckled before comming up behind him and wrapping her arms around him and resting her head against his back.

Oogie began to sprinkle in a little more pepper right when Molly decided to give him a hug and almost dumped most of the contents of the pepper shaker into the pot. After regaining his wits, he turned back as best he could to give her a dry look. "How would you like me to add you into the stew? I know Betsy would like the new addition."

Molly giggled as she let go of him and asked, "Anything else I can do?"

"Yes...swear that you'll never do that again..." Oogie replied in disgust just before muttering to himself. "Knew sewing her arm back was a bad idea."

In a dry tone, Molly clarified what she meant, "I was talking about helping with the stew..."

Oogie Boogie handed her a long wooden spoon, "Stir it while I get the spiders." As she took the spoon from him and began to do what he told her, he went to retrieve a jar filled with small spiders crawling around inside that was on top of a high shelf. As he walked back towards her, a question popped in his head and he decided to ask it. "So Doll Face, who are your parents? I'm surprised you're not anxious to get back to them as you were yesterday."

"Dr. Finkeilstein created me." she answered as she continued to stir, staring at her reflection in the strange liquid mixture. "The wife he created wanted a 'perfect daughter' to occupy her time and make herself look better than the other women in town." Now that Molly thought about it, it was rather depressing that she was created just to be her mother's little walking and talking trophy.

Tossing the spiders into the pot, he looked at Molly's slightly depressed disposition at the moment and replied, "She sounds...charming. And you must really help her prove her point."

With a fake laugh, Molly retorted bitterly, "Oh yes...she's always going on about how my antics will cause her reputation to be ruined and then adds casually how mine will be no better."

Oogie took notice of how she was stiring the stew faster now, and walked behind her, "No, no, no! You're stiring it all wrong!" he informed in a slightly annoyed tone at first before he reached around her so that one arm was on each side of her and wrapped his pointed hands around the top of the spoon just above her own hands. Turning his head to the side so he could see the contents of the pot, he added in a less harsh tone while moving the spoon slowly, "You see, if you kept stiring like that your arms will get tired quick and it might cause some of the stew to slosh over the rim." He took a step closer and soon he found his front pressed against her back, and felt her body stiffen slightly. After a few moments of stiring in silence, he remembered what he said about her mother and smirked as he thought of an overprotective mother's reaction to seeing her daughter caught in something that resembled an embrace with the most hated man in all of Halloween Town. Leaning down a bit he whispered to Molly with a dark chuckle, "You know, I would love to see your mother's reaction if she knew where you were right now."

Molly felt that same bit of vulnerability that she had felt yesterday when he grabbed her around the waist trying to prevent her from leaving in anger. It was diffrent when she teased him by flashing some leg and giving a friendly hug. It was times like this that she remembered that he was who he was; Oogie Boogie, the Boogie man. Trying to hide her discomfort, she responded, "If only she knew who you were. I asked her once about you but she didn't know."

"Darn..." Oogie muttered but grinned as he did, looking at his and her reflection in the red liquid they were stiring together. While the rag doll was wry of this close contact, he on the other hand, found himself enjoying it. Not because she felt uncomfortable, since he was unaware of this, but because she allowed him to be so close without wrinkling her nose in distaste nor was she cowering in total fear. When he first met her, he would have loved it if she trembled in constant fear, but now it seemed nice, in a diffrent way, that she didn't.

"A-almost nobody will talk about you..." she added, trying to fight her urge to let go of the spoon and slip under his arm to get away from him.

After hearing that, Oogie did not respond, though he continued to stare into the stew. Molly then noticed that within a single moment he looked angry, and upon instinct her body grew stiff; afraid that he might be rough with her for saying something wrong. But he didn't do anything to her, but instead tried to change the subject, "Looks like the stew is almost ready."

The rag doll realized that she had held her breath until she heard him speak, and after taking in a few breaths of air, she decided to allow him to change the subject. "Is it?"

"Yeah it doesn't take long once the ingredients are added." Oogie informed with a nod.

Molly then couldn't help but ask him about why the townspeople seemed to want to forget him. "Do you know why nobody wants to talk about you Boogie?"

"Probably because our 'King' doesn't like me. When he chooses not to like someone everyone has to feel that way." Oogie Boogie responded with a slight glare as he mentioned Jack the Pumpkin King.

"I didn't know Jack disliked anybody." Molly stated as she looked up at the face of Oogie instead of at his reflection. "And I snuck into his house without him knowing to find a clue about who you were. Of course this was before I had the pleasure of meeting you."

Oogie felt very flattered that she had actually wondered about who he was, and couldn't help laughing a little to hide how much of a complement that was to him. "Well I hope you weren't too disapointed..." he told her as he smiled down at her, staring into her green eyes now instead of staring at their reflections as well.

The rag doll smiled back and said, "I am still trying to figure that part out."

A few moments of silence passed before the Boogie man pretended to look hurt, "Ow...that stung."

"You know for a big guy like you..." Molly began as she then began to elbow his stomach softly, "...you sure do act like a big softie."

No longer flattered, Oogie glared down at her and mumbled, "You're just lucky the stew is ready or I would add you in."

As Oogie pulled the spoon out of her hands and placed it on a shelf to get a laddle, Molly's teasing demenor returned to her as she cooed, "Oh, you don't mean that Boogie-woogie."

The burlap man glanced back at her with a grin returning to his face, "Nope. But only because I wouldn't like the way you'd taste. Heh heh heh." After grabbing a laddle, he then got two bowls from the cupboard.

"Really?" Molly inquired innocently before she added malciously, "Didn't know you were...picky. Tee-hee."

"Oh ha ha! Maybe I'll not give you any now, since I am sooo fat I should eat it all by myself!" Oogie barked with narrowed eyes.

"Well I wouldn't want to deprive a growing sack." Molly giggled as she patted his stomach twice. When Oogie muttered as he began to pour some Snake and Spider stew into a bowl, Molly then added in a kinder tone, "Aw don't mutter like that! I'm just teasing you Boogie!"

Oogie pouted, "And I was nice enough to invite you over for dinner, **_and_** cook your favorite too."

Molly rolled her eyes, "Well you didn't like it when I was nice to you..." Oogie then shoved a bowl full of hot stew in her face for her to take. "Thanks..." she replied as she took the bowl and walked over to take a seat at the table.

"Oh now she thanks me!" the Boogie man grumbled as he fixed himself some stew and followed Molly to the table after retrieving two spoons for them.

After Oogie handed her a spoon, Molly said in her defense, "Better late than never." She smiled when she heard him chuckle and sit down across the table from her.

"I guess so." he said before he began to eat his dinner.

Molly watched him eat for awhile until she began to speak again, "Well, I did manage to learn that you're not from Halloween Town. So then where are you from?"

"Well, believe it or not, I use to rule my own holiday." Oogie replied after swallowing, and ate some more before he continued, "It was called Bug Day, but it was forgotten, so that's why I came here to Halloween Town."

Unlike anyone else who was a resident of Halloween Town, Molly was very interested in what Oogie had to say, and it showed plainly on her face. "Really? Well, that does explains a few things about you."

Oogie looked amused by her interest, "Like what Doll Face?"

"Like how bossy you are!" Molly replied with a giggle as Oogie predictably glared at her for her responce.

"At least I have an excuse!" he snapped before he continued in an accusing tone of voice, "You're just as bossy as I am! Or maybe the word manipulitive fits better for you!"

"I am not manpulitive!" the rag doll woman said, now being the defensive one as she folded her arms over her chest and said as-a-matter-of-factly. "I prefer to be called a con artist!"

A low chuckle escaped Oogie, "So how's the stew? I noticed you have yet to taste it."

Molly realized that this was true, since she had gotten caught up in asking Oogie questions she forgot to try his stew. Taking the spoon in her hand and dipped it into the bowl to fill the untensil with the liquid. Once she got her desired amount of stew, she brought the spoon to her black stitched lips and sipped politely. The warm broth slid down her throat in a pleasent way. "Wow!" she exclaimed, forgetting how great a taste the dish really was, and it seemed even better than she last remembered. "It's great!"

Oogie chuckled at her enthusiasm, "Gambling isn't the only thing I am good at."

"I'd say!" Molly agreed as she continued eating the dinner she and Oogie prepared together.

At first, the Boogie man seemed shocked that she actually agreed with him, but that was a fake response. Oogie then looked proud, "Was that a genuine complement?" he asked in a suspicious tone, though it was more like he was gloating. "I should make note of this day. It's history!"

The rag doll rolled her green eyes at him, "Not like you give me a bunch of complements either, Boogie."

A sleezy grin crept up on his features as Oogie tilted his head so he could gaze under the table for a moment before he casually stated, "You have nice legs."

"Thanks, I can tell you mean that by how much you stare at them." Molly replied, sounding like she didn't really care about what he said.

Because she didn't seem offended, or to even give much thought to what he told her, Oogie got irritated. "Oh of course! You did everything you could to get me to, you cheater!"

"I didn't cheat!" Molly growled, then added in a guilty sounding mutter, "...Today..."

"HA!" Oogie slammed down his fists on the table before he pointed an accusing pointed hand at her, "I KNEW IT!" The rag doll stuck her tongue out at the burlap sack in response. "Oh that's attractive Doll Face."

"Judging by your taste, I would think so." Molly retorted, before asking with a knowing grin. "Or you think that I didn't notice that you were drooling through half of the fifth game?"

Oogie blinked once before he blurted out, "I WAS THINKING!"

"And just what about?" Molly asked curiously as she propped her elbows on the table after finishing her stew and rested her chin in her palms.

Knowing that he set himself up, Oogie chose not to answer her question and muttered to himself as he continued eating his stew. For a long time neither of them said anything, and the Boogie man stared down at his bowl for the most part, since Molly continued to stare at him intently. Glancing up at her again, he cleared his throat and asked, "So um...tell me...is spending time here...w-with me really more enjoyable than being out conning people in the town with those three pains in the neck?"

Molly still looked at him and nothing else as she answered, "Well, I don't get to con people as much as I use to with that job I've been forced to take, but yeah. I like spending time here. Kinda fun playing against someone who actually knows how to play the same games I do." Looking out of the small window that was also in this room, she took notice that the night sky was getting darker and stood up. "Oh hey I have go get going...it's getting late."

"Alright then." Oogie said, though his tone was soft, since he didn't want her to go, but there wasn't anything he could think of that would make her stay. After he finished his last spoonful of stew, he asked, "You gonna visit again tomorrow Doll Face?"

"'Course I am." she responded with a smile, "I've got Mothitus remember?" Molly then coughed into her hand a few times, trying to make herself sound sick.

Oogie chuckled softly, "Then I'll see you later Dolly." then he gave her a wink.

Molly winked back, "Later Boogie boy."

Oogie watched as the raven haired doll woman walked out of the room and when she was out of sight he began to grin widely. He stood up, taking both his and her dishes as he walked over towards a sink. The boogie man had a sudden impulse to start singing his line from _This is Halloween _when a curious Lock poked his head into the room and gave Oogie a smug little grin. "Gee, don't you sound happy."

At once the burlap man stopped singing and threw one of the bowls he was washing at Lock's head. "Shut up! I was just seeing if I still remembered it!" he growled, not wanting the brat to ruin the good mood he was in. The bowl he threw colided into Lock's head and broke upon impact. Lock fell back and in a daze, seemed to see stars floating around his head. This caused Oogie to chuckle as he contiued singing and washing the dishes he and Molly used for their fist dinner together.

* * *

Welp we're on chapter five, good to see that I've still got people keeping up with the fic! Glad to hear you're all enjoying the ride! It's going to get more exciting for these two very soon, but I just need to decide when they take off into that part of the story!

Thanks for the following for reviewing since the last updation:

SexySaiyanSakura

Moonliterider

Quillian91

Queen Freaky

Marissa

Jack's Sweetie

White-Angel

I'll try to update more often, but I can't make big promises. Lately I've been sooooooooooo busy and it's getting soooo stressful with school that on weekends I try not to do almost anything. But hopefully the school stuff won't get to me for too much longer! Don't forget to read and review more my old and to whoever is new reading this!

LaterZ

Sydney Daimao


	7. VI: Foes Change to Friends

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's it folks!

Author's Notes: I'd like to thank my good friend, Marissa, who is the one this fic is deticated to, and also to another good friend, SexySaiyanSakura, who without her help, this chapter or several others, might not have lived up to their full potential. And thank you to those who reviewed since my last chapter! Now...ON WITH THE NEW CHAPTER!

* * *

Chapter Six: Foes Change to Friends

"Keep up the good work folks!" Shouted the Mayor with his megaphone in hand as he walked through the town square. "Only 60 days left until Halloween!" The Mayor was in a pretty good mood today, and it was obvious with his smile on his happy, rosy cheeked face. Everything was going according to the Halloween plans that he and Jack came up with, especially without a certain raven haired rag doll causing problems with the minions of the still assumed dead Oogie Boogie. In fact, at the moment he was making his way to the Witches' Shop to check up on the daughter of Dr. Finkelstien to make sure she was behaving.

The short and stout elected offical opened the door to the shop and tipped his very tall top hat at the two witches. "Afternoon ladies!"

"Good afternoon Mayor." The two witches greeted politely as the Mayor walked up to them. "Care to buy some Marrow Mints?"

"No-no." the Mayor first responded shaking his head and waving his hands in front of his face, but then looked thoughtful. "Well..." He had to shake his head to rid himself of his indecisive train of thought in order to keep on task. "What I really came to ask is if the Finkelstien's girl has been working hard like she's suppose to."

The witches looked at each other before they returned their gaze back to the Mayor. "Perhaps you should be the judge of that..." the shorter witch said as she jumpped off her stack of books that she used so she could see over the countertop and lead the Mayor into the back room where all their edible merchandise was made.

This caused the Mayor to switch faces so that his worried blue and white face was in front. "Why...?" he began to ask until the short witch opened the door and showed the Mayor of town what Molly was up to.

The rag doll was busy making treats, humming the melody of their town's theme as she worked and when she had to move to do something else, she did it with a graceful twirl or some other form of dance. "...I am the shadow on a moonlit night, filling your dreams to the brim of fright!" Molly sang softly as she slid in two trays of unbaked bone biscuits into the oven and closed the lid of it with her foot.

"She's been acting so...cheerful for the past two weeks now..." the short witch informed the Mayor in a low whisper to avoid catching Molly's attention.  
"...and it's downright...scary..."

The Mayor seemed wry of the rag doll's strange change in demenor, "Do you know why she's become so..." then he remembed that horrid word Jack used to describe Christmas last year, "...jolly?"

The witch gave a shrug, "No, and she's been working so diligently that she's going to fill the quota for next year!"

Both of them jumpped when they heard Molly's voice say, "Hello Mayor."

After both the witch and the Mayor recovered from their momentary fright, the Mayor greeted her back in a polite stutter. "H-hello M-Molly..."

"Checking up on how I'm doing?" the rag doll asked as she leaned against the doorway.

"Um...well...yes..." the Mayor continued to say, his worried face on but it soon changed back to his happy face. "And I must say, I'm impressed Molly!"

Molly responded modestly, "I'm just doing my job." Looking at the time, she then said to them, "And now it's the end of my shift so I guess I'll have to see you later Mayor."

As the rag doll walked out of the kitchen and out of the shop itself, the Mayor turned to the Short Witch and asked her, "You gave her a shorter work day?"

"We had to, or else we'd be up to our necks in bone biscuits!" she repsonded.

Molly was indeed becoming more enthusastic around work, and walked around with a smile on her face. Nobody in town understood what caused this change in her. Truth was, it was because of her frequent visits to the lair of Oogie Boogie to see the Boogie man with the same interests as her. The once apathetic rag doll now had something to look forward to instead of the same old thing. This caused her to work more efficently, and this in turn, gave her a shorter work day, which meant more time to see Oogie.

* * *

"Well, it looks like you three did a good job of cleaning up in that room." Oogie stated with a grin as heard the groans comming from Lock, Shock, and Barrel. 

They were standing in a hall of his lair, or rather, Oogie was standing and the children were sitting down on the ground exausted. A cruel chuckle of amusement for their misery escaped the large sack man until he heard the familiar arrival of Molly's boots echoing off the walls in the torture chamber. Oogie walked past the tired children to go greet Molly with his stitched grin, one that she returned with her own stitched, black painted lips.

"Hey Boogie boy." she greeted as she approched him.

"Doll Face..." Oogie responded, with his grin growing. He had grown very fond of having the daily visits from the rag doll, more than he would have liked to admit to anyone, even himself. When he thought back to how they first met, he could have never guessed that things would end up like this. Not even a month later could he figure out how it happened, but he would never regret whatever it was that caused it.

A soft chuckle escaped her as she told Oogie in a determined tone, "You're going down today! I'm not leaving here until I beat you at pool Boogie man!"

"Well then you're not leaving here today, since I have something diffrent planned for us." Oogie said with a chuckle.

Molly gave him a curious look, "Really? What is it?"

Another chuckle, which was deep this time, came from Oogie, "You've got to guess Molly dear."

Raising her brow, she asked, "I thought you hated guessing games."

"Only when I'm the one guessing." Oogie replied.

"At least give me a hint. For all I know it could be anything." Molly sighed, now understanding how Oogie felt when she played guessing games with him. It really wasn't as much fun to guess as it was making someone else guess.

"Alright," Oogie agreed and thought for a moment about what he should tell her that wouldn't give away too much of the surprise. "Hmm well, it's a room that you have to move a lot in."

Not able to resist teasing the Boogie man, Molly pretended to guess, "Your bathroom?"

Oogie's smile dropped as he gave her a dry look and replied sarcastically, "Yes, I am planning on drowning you in my toilet." This caused Molly to giggle, and since Oogie wasn't patient enough to continue the guessing game with her, he ended it. "Close your eyes."

Molly gave him a skeptical look for a long time until she finally obeyed and closed her eyes, "Okay..." she sighed, "...I can't see...so now what?" It wasn't long after she uttered those words that she felt his burlaps hands take hers into them and felt the looming presence over her that once made her uneasy.

"You follow me." Oogie stated in a whisper, walking backwards now into the hall of his lair, leading her slowly towards a room that was past the Billiard Parlor that they spent many hours playing Bat Snot in. Past the Kitchen where they had prepared several dinners together in the past month, and into a room on the right side of the hall for once.

At first sight, the room Oogie lead Molly into was dark, and almost nothing in it could be seen just yet. Once he got her right in the middle of the room, he then let go of her hands and said, "Okay...now open your eyes..."

Just as she opened her eyes she realized it was pitch black in the room, and the only thing she could see was the neon green burlap sack that she now called her friend. "Okay Oogie, is this your idea of a..." Oogie walked over to a wall and hit a switch which made the entire floor to light up in neon colored tiles, and from up above them was a large jack-o-lantern lamp which changed colors every five seconds. "...wow.."

Her expression of surprise and wonder was like sweet honey to Oogie, and it was a very diffrent kind of enjoyment that he had only recently experienced. After all, he was use to getting his kicks from torturing others, but this felt just as rewarding...maybe even more...**_maybe_**.

Walking around the room and inspecting the disco-styled floor, Molly turned back to Oogie and told him, "This place is so so wicked Boogie!"

"Well of course it is!" Oogie replied proudly, "I created it, though I haven't used it in awhile so I had those kids do something useful when you left yesterday and clean it up a bit. Didn't think this lair built itself, did you?"

Chuckling softly, Molly told him, "Of course not. It's just so amazing, it's hard to believe you built it all by yourself."

Oogie walked over to her again and held out his hand for her in a dramatic gesture, "Shall we dance then?" When he was rewarded with her soft smile and delecate looking hand, the Boogie man's grin grew wider so the corners of his mouth seemed to disapear behind his head. "Hit it!" Oogie ordered in a comanding tone as he pointed to a still dark corner of the room, and almost immediatly, the corner was lit up in the same kind of neon lights to reveal a jazz band of skeletons Oogie had found around his lair.

The skeleton band's largest and most attention grabbing instrament was a large coffin shaped piano with a tall skeleton that glowed a neon yellow on the far left. The Saxophone, Trombone, and Clarinet player were a neon red, blue, and green and the Trumpet player was bright violet and of average height. Upon Oogie's order, the all began to play their instraments to create a loud, and fast pace jazzy tune for the two to dance to.

Molly was impressed by the band, the room, the whole thing. When she turned back to stare into Oogie's empty sockets, and grinning face. She returned it with a nervous grin, "You know I've never had a dance partner before..." she admitted reluctantly as she now avoided his gaze.

"Neither have I..." Oogie responded softly, catching her attention, "...so we'll just learn together." Wrapping his free arm around her waist, and holding the hand that held hers out to their side, he began to lead Molly in a slow dance at first. When the doll woman got the hang of the dance steps, which didn't take long, that's when Oogie picked up the pace and Molly was able to keep up and in no time the two were enjoying themselves greatly.

As the first song came to a close, and a new instramental song began to be performed by Oogie's skeleton band, Oogie dipped his dance partner, causing her to giggle in a delightful way. "You must have a lot of fun with such a room like this." she said to him.

Smiling in an out of character softness, Oogie replied warmly, "I do now..." and with that said he began to lead her in another, slower dance.

"It couldn't be because of me, could it?" Molly asked with a knowing look.

"Maybe..." the Boogie man admitted after looking thoughtful for a moment but he added quickly, "...or maybe those three pains in the neck have finally stopped bugging me...hard to tell really." Then he decided to twirl Molly around then turned her into him in a half embrace for a moment before spinning her out so that they would be as far apart as they could without letting go of each other's hands.

"You're not that bad of a dancer Boogie boy." Molly complemented before Oogie pulled her back to him and continued to dance with their bodies closer.

"And I for one, am greatful that you're not half bad." Oogie responded, trying to make it sound more like an insult than a complement. "After all, those boots of yours would hurt if you stepped on my feet."

Not able to resist the natural urge to tease her new friend, Molly pretended to almost step on his foot, making him wince from the expectation of pain. "Hehe...you mean like that?"

Oogie narrowed his eye sockets before he spoke in an irritable sarcastic way, "Oh ha ha..." After watching Molly stick out the tip of her tongue to continue her playful mockery, he grinned and stuck out his own tongue right back at her, which was a yellow and black stripped snake with red eyes that made a hiss as it emerged from his mouth. This of course, caused Molly's viberent green eyes to widen from the unexpected visit of his snake tongue, making its owner smile more. "Something wrong?" he asked, pretending to be oblivious, then acting like he suddenly realized what she was surprised about. "Oh...hehe..." leaning closer so his face was closer to hers, he added, "It bites too..." and the snake in his mouth that served as his tongue emerged again trying to bite Molly's nose but the rag doll leaned back far enough to avoid it.

After that the two continued to dance without much conversation between each other as the band continued the melodys that their foot work relied upon. Oogie performed a series of twirls and dips as they danced through several songs, and in turn, this caused Molly to laugh in her lovely feminine way. It wasn't until the band ceased their playing to take a break when the two dancers decided to do the same. Molly felt a little lightheaded from all the twirls and dips, but her pale face still held a smile that would have gone ear to ear if she had ears. Oogie's face reflected a smililar grin, and at the moment he felt a little awkward since he could not think of anything to say at in the moment of silence which felt uneasy to him.

"You know I have a lot of fun with you." Molly spoke first, which made Oogie feel luckier than he would have felt if he had finally rolled a seven with his dice.

"And people say I have no social skills..." the Boogie Man responded with a deep chuckle.

Molly's wide grin changed to a soft smile as she chuckled her reply, "Most would say the same of me." Oogie began to feel awkward again when this left the two of them with very little to say. He especially felt odd when she continued to stare up at him with her big green eyes, but this adoring gaze was soon broken when those lovely eyes widened. The rag doll gasped before asking, "Oogie, do you know what time it is?"

Oogie glanced over to the corner where the band was and remembered that there was a clock in the same corner. "It's almost six o'clock Doll, why?"

Another sharp gasp of distress came from her, "Oh no, I should have left awhile ago...I told my mother I wasn't working late again!" Taking his hand in both of hers, she told him in a reasuring tone, "I'll make sure to come and see you again tomorrow, that is if I'm still alive." Molly laughed nevously over her somewhat exaggerated statement before dashing out of the room to head back home.

Oogie waved with a bewildered look, since it seemed so sudden that she had to leave. With a big sigh, he walked over to a bar that was on the other end of the room near the corner where the band was performing. "Why does it seem that whenever I start to enjoy myself, she has to leave?" he asked no one in particular with a sigh of disapointment.

The bartender, which was yet another skeleton that glowed blue, shrugged its boney shoulders before shaking up a drink for its depressed master.

* * *

Molly ran all the way back to the Labratory tower, and when she reached for the door, it suddenly opened, and her mother, Jewel, stood there waiting for her with a very upset look on her face. "Molly Finkelstien!" her shrill voice shrieked, causing her daughter to cringe from both the sound and from the impending lecture that would soon follow. "Where in All Hallos' Eve **_have_** you been! You informed me this morning as you left the house that you **_wouldn't_** be working late. Now tell me why is it that you're here at..." she glanced over to a large grandfather clock that was inside the enterance room of the Labratory and pulled her lip back in anger. "...**_six fifteen at night_**!" 

"I was...just out..." Molly replied, feeling like slapping her forehead for not thinking up of an excuse. Lately she must have gotten rusty, for it seemed harder and harder for her to come up with excuses as to why she showed up late.

"Out?" Jewel repeated with a raised brow, "OUT! Out doing what!" Grabbing her daughter's arm to pull her roughly into their home she then slammed the door, creating a loud wooden smack echoing off the walls. Turning to her daughter, who was now giving her an apathetic look, giving her a more doll like apperance, the blonde mother continued to scold Molly. "I bet you were out with those friends of yours again, weren't you! And you were behaving so well for the past month aside from this suspicious behavior going out to this unknown place practically every day for hours on end! I talked to the witches today, they have told me that a couple of weeks ago they made your work days SHORTER! So care to tell me what you've**_ really _**been up to?"

Molly blinked once before she narrowed her eyes in irritation. Did she have to justify everything she did? Perhaps she deserved that in the past when her credibility was questionable, but now she had made sure to act in a way that the town and her mother considered proper. Couldn't she at least be rewarded with a little more freedom? Of course not. Not when what she could be doing with that freedom might tarnish her mother and her father's good name. At least that's what the raven haired creation knew her mother was thinking at the moment. Still she felt the need to point this out, "I haven't been doing anything that would hurt your reputation, mother! I think I'm woman enough not to have to tell you every little thing I do aside from breathe!"

"Excuse me!" Jewel responded, taken aback by Molly's back talk. "Don't you dare sass me young lady! Your father might be too busy to discipline you, but I sure as Lucifer, am not!"

"Why can't you ever listen to what I have to say! Everything else I have been doing for the past month has been what YOU or someone else tells me to do! I LIKE making my own decisions! And one of them happens to be not telling you about what I do with my life after work!" Molly continued to stand up for herself, raising her voice in a very confident tone that she used when she defied Oogie Boogie.

Jewel's jaw dropped, "Molly Finkelstein..." she said in a soft tone, which changed back to her shrill yelling voice, "...you WILL tell ME what it is you're up to! It's a boy, isn't it? You've been spending these hours with a man you KNOW neither your father or I would approve of, HAVEN'T YOU!"

"IT'S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!" Molly yelled to match her mother. Truth was that her mother was most likely right, but not in the way her mother thought. Right after she did this though, she felt her mother's hand across her face, leaving a stinging sensation on her pale cheek. After being slapped, Molly could not help but take a step back, since she had never been slapped across the face before. Placing her hand to the cheek that had been hit, she felt it that it was sore and could feel it growing red without having a mirror there to vindicate this notion.

Her furious mother still stood in front of her, glowering at her before she said in a virulent tone, "That is the last time you will get away with disobeying me Molly Finkelstein! You're not yet a woman until I decide you are, and that will be when you are married to a man both your father and I approve of and you no longer live under **_our_** roof! Now go to your room!"

At the moment Molly felt a serge of emotions which was mostly outrage towards her mother's behavior and frustration that she would never be trustworthy in the eyes of her mother. Not that keeping the secret visits to Oogie's lair a secret made her particularly trustworthy to begin with, she only did that because she knew her mother would never approve of her going to gamble with a friend who happened to be the Boogie Man. After hearing her mother's demand for her to go to her room, the rag doll bolted for the door and ran out of the Labrotory and down the stone stairs, heading towards the cemetary. She could hear her mother calling out to her to come back but she ignored it.

When her disobedent daughter would not come back, and since Jewel was not the type of lady to go running after people, she threw her arms in the air. "I can't deal with her anymore! I don't know where I went wrong but this has to stop!" Slamming the front door again, she then began to think about how she might be able to control Molly better. "Using force doesn't seem to work as much as it use to...hmmm...I'll figure something out..."

* * *

After this incident happened, Oogie sent the his three little minions out to play while he made dinner, and actually planned to feed them instead of having them eat candy for their dinner like he usually did. Though lately, Oogie had been feeding them for the past week. "It's been so great having Molly and Oogie see each other every day!" Barrel declaired with a jump. "I wonder what he'll make tonight!" 

"Can't be Snake and Spider stew, we had that last night, plus I think he's getting a little tired of it." Lock said with a grin as he and the other two trick-or-treaters walked towards the cemetary on foot this time.

"Awww..." Barrel moaned hanging his head in disapointment.

Shock shook her head, also in a good mood that night, "See boys? I knew that making it seem that Molly really liked Oogie so he wouldn't kill her would lead to them being friends! Now Oogie and Molly are happier, and so are we! And it's all thanks to me!"

"No it's not!" Lock was quick to protest, "You didn't come up with the idea for them to meet!"

"Well you didn't!" Shock growled, getting in the boy dressed as a devil's face.

Barrel watched as Lock and Shock began to fight in the predictable manner the always did, and was greatful this time that he wasn't apart of it. Shock had a mean right hook, and Lock was prone to biting with his pointed teeth. The two fought physically with each other all the way to the cemetary, and even more when they were there. The boy dressed as a skeleton though, grew bored of watching them fight without something delicious to munch on, and began to look around the cemetary. Usually the hanging tree was around, but it seemed the tree was in another part of the area tonight. However, something else caught his eye, and his curiousity got the best of him as he left his fighting friends to investigate. He thought he saw the back of someone's head that he knew, and when he peeked his head around a circle of tombstones, he saw that his guess was right.

"Molly?" he asked with wide eyes, jumping back as well after the rag doll snapped her head up to see who called her name. Her face had been buried in the palms of her hands, and now Barrel could see her slightly red eyes, which could only be a result from crying. "W-what are you doing here? I thought you went home?"

Molly didn't seem like she wanted to answer, and since Barrel didn't know what to do, he decided to get his other two cohorts who came up with better ideas than he did. It took awhile, but he managed to break up their fight and convinced them to come over to where he found Molly. Once Lock and Shock saw Molly, their eyes widened, since they never saw her look so sad before they all glanced at each other, only thinking of one thing to do to try and cheer their friend up.

* * *

"Ugh...I'm all out of ingredients for Snake and Spider stew, Worm's Wart, AND Centipede Casserole!" Oogie bellowed in his kitchen, throwing up his arms. He was in an okay mood, but now he didn't know what to make for dinner. Scratching under his chin, he then happened to glance over at a large jar of flies. "Ah...that'll be diffrent..." When the sounds of multiple feet comming towards the kitchen caught his attention, Oogie turned to glare, assuming it was his minions. "I told you not to bother me when I'm cook..." he began to yell at them irritably, until he saw that they were not alone. "...ing...?" At first he was caught off guard by seeing Molly back, since she hadn't been gone for more than an hour. Not able to stop himself from grinning at her unexpected return, he said to her with a croon, "Why, Molly...to what do I owe this unexpected surprise?" 

"Um...I was...just out for a walk..." Molly replied softly, avoiding his gaze.

Since Oogie didn't seem to notice her odd change in dispoition, Lock decided to approch their boss and held a hand to block his mouth so nobody besides Oogie could hear him. "Something's up with her. You might wanna cheer her up and find out what it is Oogie." Before Oogie could respond, the devil costume clad boy ran out of the kitchen along with Shock and Barrel to leave the two alone, but this didn't mean that they wouldn't linger close by to find out what was going on with Molly.

As he watched the kids leave, Oogie thought with a growl, 'Little brats left me! Just how do they expect me to...cheer her up? I don't cheer people up, I scare them!'

But before the Boogie man could think of something else, Molly asked him in a softer tone than she normally used, which now struck him as odd. "So...you were making dinner?"

"Split fly soup." he replied, then began to ponder over just how he could cheer Molly up.

"Need help?" she asked, trying to sound more like herself, but her enthusiasm just wasn't there.

Oogie grinned as he extended his hand to her, "I think I could use a hand..." then he added mentally, '...that was corny.'

The joke didn't really seem to make the rag doll smile. "What do you need me to do then?" she asked in her still distant tone.

"You could get that jar of flies over on that shelf." instructed Oogie as he pointed to where she could find the jar. He watched as she moved in a sluggish pace, which was unlike the normal Molly. Something happened in the time that passed after she left his lair, and whatever it was must have been very upsetting. Even when in the face of danger, she had that feisty spirit, but now those eyes held a dull look as she brought the jar of dead flies over to him. "Mind stirring while I add them in?" he asked her after taking the jar from her. Molly shrugged and took the wooden spoon and began to stir the contents of the bowl with an idle look with one hand.

While Oogie added the flies into the pot, he glanced over at Molly from the corner of his eye and took notice that her left cheek was red. Once he was done adding the flies, he set the jar down then took a step closer towards the raven haired doll. Reaching out to touch her reddened cheek gingerly, he asked curiously, "What happened Doll Face?"

Upon feeling the burlap hand bursh against her face, Molly flinched slightly, then looked back at Oogie, in the eyes for the first time since she came back but quickly avertered her gaze. "O-oh this?" she asked in a stutter. "I-I..." she had to think quickly of an excuse that sounded convincing. "...I fell. When I was running back home, I tripped over something and fell."

Noticing that her eyes were also slightly red, Oogie raised his brows, not entirely convinced but he did not press her for the truth. Cupping her chin with the same hand that touched her cheek, he turned her head so she would look at him. "Must have been a hard fall."

"W-well I was running fast..." Molly added, though it still didn't convince Oogie, so she continued to avoid looking at him in the eyes.

Letting her get away with another obvious lie, the Boogie man told her, "Well I have something you could put on it so you don't have a bruise on your pretty little doll face."

Normally such a gesture would have earned him a warm black liped smile, but Molly seemed alarmed instead. "Oh no, it's not that serious, really."

"A bruise on your face?" Oogie questioned, "Oh I beg to differ my dear." Ignoring her protest, he began to search through a cupboard for the item he informed her about.

"Oogie..." Molly sighed, "...you're really making a big deal out of nothing. I'm sure it won't bruise, really."

"Nonsense! You can never can be too careful." he responded with a careless tone before he grabbed a container that he had been searching for. Popping open the lid, he dipped his hand into the container which was filled with a milky white cream. It was something he developed himself to use on his juvenile minions, since they managed to beat each other until they looked like purple and blue spotted Dalmatians. Using the cream free hand, he tipped her delecate chin up so he could apply the cream on the sore cheek.

Still managing to keep her distant eyes away from him, she mumbled softly, "Thank you."

Oogie's old grin returned to him, "Don't mention it...just don't tell anyone that Oogie can be nice."

'Who would I tell?' Molly thought with a very small smile as he finished applying the cream. "I won't tell."

'Ah-ha! So she finally cracked a smile! Now I'm getting somewhere!' Oogie thought with a chuckle, "Was that a smile I see? Been wondering where that went."

Knowing that he wasn't as oblivious as she had hoped, Molly was quick to act defensive. "I just haven't had a reason to smile yet is all."

Pretending to be upset, the burlap sack man pouted and asked, "What about my corny hand joke?" When all she did to reply was give him a dry look, Oogie let his shoulders droop. "Could have humored me."

"Hahaha..." Molly laughed, though it was a sarcastic one, "...there, happy?"

"No, but I'll humor you." Realizing that the soup had come to a boil, he added, "Soup's done." Turning his empty sockets back to Molly, Oogie told her, "Here, go sit down and I'll fix us both a bowl."

Molly took a seat that was as close to her as possible, and even when Oogie sat a bowl in front of her, she could not find the appitie to eat it. Instead she stared at her dull expression that was reflected in the greenish black soup. Her head rosed when she heard the Boogie man say to her, "I didn't poison it, and my cooking isn't that bad."

Just to appease him, Molly took the spoon in her hand and quickly sipped the small spoonful before leaving the metal utensil in the bowl and now stared at the cracks in the wooden table.

"Alright, what's wrong Molly?" Oogie asked at last with a sigh of defeat, since being subtle wasn't his forte.

"Nothing, why?" she questioned with a glare of annoyance.

"Because it's obvious you're upset about something when you're using a bowl of soup as a mirror." was Oogie's reply.

"I'm just not hungry." the rag doll woman clairfied with a matter-of-factly tone before pushing the bowl towards Oogie. "You can have it."

Looking at the bowl for three sections before returning his focus on Molly again, Oogie Boogie grinned, "Do I look like a fat sack of bugs to you?"

"Do you really want me to answer that Boogie?" she growled, now getting very annoyed.

Pouting, he responded, "Only if it makes you talk."

"Fine, then yes, you do!" she answered sternly.

A sniffle came from the Boogie man, "Okay be mean to me then."

Rolling her green eyes, Molly sighed before growling, "You're the Boogie man, you should be able to take mean comments better than this!" Standing up, she then yelled out in frustration that wasn't necessarily directed towards Oogie. "CAN'T I BE MEAN IF I WANT TO BE!"

Watching her as she threw her hands up in the air and begin to stomp out of the kitchen and down the hall with a few blinks, Oogie decided to follow her. Once she was back in his sights, he marched up to her, with a more stern sounding voice and his brows narrowed. "Yes normally, though your mean usually isn't so mean." When she turned and gave him a glare, he sighed and added, "Look, if you don't want to tell me what's wrong I can't help. And as you can see, I'm not so good at the whole cheering up thing."

"WHO TOLD YOU I NEEDED TO BE CHEERED UP!" the shorter doll woman demanded, reminding herself a little of her mother at the moment, but she couldn't help it. She felt so angry at that moment, and Oogie's questions seemed to make it worse.

"Your friends did..." Oogie answered in a still calm tone, which even surprised himself, since normally he'd be yelling right back at her. "...something I've never had before." he added bitterly to himself.

"Oh boo-hoo! Poor Oogie-woogie." Molly cooed with a slight pout to mock a sympathetic response.

Now that Oogie had reached his limit, he no longer felt the need to make her feel better when all she would do is yell at him and degrade him. "Apparently I was right! So why did you come here then? Just to yell at me? Go back home!" Waving her off he turned his back to her and began to walk away.

'No wait, I didn't mean it! Please don't make me go back home!' cried Molly mentally, wanting to voice her thoughts out loud but her pride prevented her from doing so. "Fine! I will then!" she finally said before she turned to leave, frantically trying to think of where she would go now. That was, until she felt her arm being grabbed roughly and pulled back towards the Boogie man.

'She's just being stubborn!' he thought to himself as he pulled her to him and told her sternly, "Not until you tell me why you came here? I don't think it was to yell at me for being...nice." When they both engagged in a glaring contest, Oogie felt the need to add, "I can be patient when I choose to be Doll Face." and kept a firm grip on her arm.

Green eyes continued to glare at him stubbornly, but finally a sigh of defeat escaped Molly. "Lock, Shock and Barrel saw me in the Cemetary and brought me here okay?"

"Then why were you in the cemetary? I thought you said you had to get home?" Oogie continued to question her, never letting his grip on her arm loosen.

"I did go home...but then I left..." she answered bluntly.

Looking more curious now, he continued the series of questions and answers, "Left hm? And your..mother didn't mind? From the way you sounded earlier she doesn't seem the type who would like that."

"Ha!" Molly scoffed at what he said, "She keeps telling me I can't do things that involve my own decision making. She's just so..." Molly clenched her fist in anger, but in a moment she sighed, casting her eyes down. "...you just wouldn't understand." Soon she felt the burlap hand loosen around her arm, and eventually pulled away when Oogie walked a few steps from her, sitting on the ground so he could lean back against the wall.

"Then enlighten me Doll Face." he finally replied, as he patted the area on the ground next to him.

With a sigh, she obliged to his wish, and sat down beside him. "You see, I'm suppose to do what she says. My father can care less about what I do, because I'm not his responsibility. I'm my mother's. So she feels like she has to boss me around in order to keep me from doing something that would tarnish her reputation. And for the past month I've made sure that I kept myself out of trouble, so that maybe she could lay off, but **_nooo_**!" Putting on a high pitched voice, Molly began to immitate her mother, "You're not a woman until you're married to a man your father and I approve of and no longer live under our roof!"

Oogie had been listening to her intently, and snorted at the last comment. "Trust me Doll Face, you're very much a woman." To emphasize his meaning, he raised his brows a few times with a grin.

Molly shook her head in disaprovement, but her small laugh betrayed her action. "Tell that to my mother then." Yet another sigh escaped her lips before she leaned to the side and resting her head on Oogie's shoulder. "Hey...sorry about before. I was just taking out my anger on you but that's no excuse. I should have talked to you like a real friend."

"Well you can always try that next time." replied Oogie. When she scooted even closer towards him, and leaned even more against him, he watched her in silence, feeling odd at the moment. It wasn't everyday that he had someone willingly lean on him, especially not a beautiful woman; rag doll or not.

"Oogie? Think I can stay here for the night?" asked the raven haired doll, with half open eyes, speaking in a sleepy tone. "I'm just so tired."

Unable to stop himself from grinning wide, he answered softly, "Of course. Maybe letting your mother worry for a bit would teach her a lesson."

A soft yawn came from Molly, "Yeah...maybe..." Her eyes closed all the way now, she scooted even closer to him, practically using Oogie's side as an oversized pillow. "Good night Oogie."

"Night...Doll Face." Oogie was able to make himself say in response. Again he was surprised by her want to be closer to him, and her security to think it was alright for her to sleep against him. Thoughts about how angry she got when he used her as a pillow came to mind, but he did not mention it. After all, they were a lot more friendly to each other now. It was laughable now, how easily he let the rag doll get away with doing things he normally would never let anyone do. Pretending to strech his arms up so he could raise them, he then put his arm around the slumbering Molly. In response, Molly leaned back more, so that now most of her body was resting against his shoulder and ample stomach. Oogie watched her sleep with a grin until Lock, Shock and Barrel got his attention.

"I'm hungry..." Barrel blurted out first, his voice seeming to murder the silence that managed to fall between Molly and Oogie, in a moment that the burlap sack didn't want to end just yet.

Narrowing his brows at the three children, he opened his mouth to yell at them, but when Molly shifted her weight, he remembered that she was trying to sleep. "Then go into the kitchen and serve yourselves!" he managed to surpress his anger so it came out in a harsh whisper. The children then ran off towards the kitchen on their short legs, chuckling the whole way at the sight of their rag doll friend sleeping on their boss.

* * *

Phew, SO SOOOOOOOOOOOORRY for the late update! I have been busy yet again! But good news is that I managed to update the story and in the meantime, come up with a NEW idea for the fic! So tell me what you think of the chapter? One month can certainly change things for both Molly and Oogie, can't it? 

Oh and Jewel slapping Molly wasn't intended for some kind of drama, it was used to show that Molly is after all, A DAUGHTER who rarely gets punished. She wasn't really upset that her mother slapped her, even though it was the first time she had gotten one. She was more angry with the fact that Jewel monitors her so much. Just wanted to clarify that.

I'd like to thank the following for their reivews:

Quillian91

Queen Freaky

Moonliterider

Jack's Sweetie

SexySaiyanSakura

Virdrag

Marissa

White-angel

SappireLight

PyroManiac198

Kaitlynn

Last chapter I updated recieved ELEVEN REIVEWS! Three of them by new readers and reviewers! I hope that you all continue to read along with the new chapter and the chapters yet to come. And a note to new reviewers, I hope you've enjoyed the story so far! I look forward to seeing your reviews on this chapter! I'll try to make update the next chapter as soon as possible!

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	8. VII: Interference

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly, and Vladimir, but that's it folks!

Author's Note: Special thanks goes to SexySayainSakura, and Marissa, for helping me through the editing process. Now I have the old Word document working on my laptop. Crappy trial thing that came with the laptop quit on me after three months, so I've had to write on wordpad for the past three chapters or so. Well, on to the new chapter!

* * *

Chapter Seven: Interference

In the morning after Molly ran out of the Laboratory, Jewel went up to the top of the tower to speak with her husband. "And she hasn't been home all night!" Jewel continued after explaining to Dr. Finkelstein what had happened. "I just don't know what to do with her anymore!"

Dr. Finkelstein looked away from his microscope to look at his blonde wife. "Well, I told you before I made Molly that she would be a lot of hard work."

"Well can you at least talk to her when, or more like**_ if_**, she comes back home?" Jewel asked with a tired sigh. "She listens to you." When the doctor nodded, she then put on a more peppy tone of voice. "Well I'm off to town to see what is new!"

It didn't take long for the blonde to finish making herself presentable, since she was the type to make sure she looked her best even when she would stay home all day. Walking into town with her duck-shaped head held high, she then noticed that there was a rather large crowd of people near the gate that lead in and out of town. Curiosity in what got people's attention lead Jewel towards the crowd, and she had to squeeze through several people to catch a glimpse at what was going on.

There stood a new fellow she had never seen in town before. His long chestnut brown hair was wavy, and stood out against his deadly pale skin. Corpse blue bags were under his blood red eyes, and his face was complemented with a pointed nose, and equally pointed chin that made him handsome in the eyes of most women who treasured the sophisticated look. Even his long black robes, with the high collar that showed the red silk lining, screamed that he had class. The Vampire whom was a stranger to the town, was one who enjoyed the finer things in life. His height was even to Jack Skellington, who was actually standing by his side, along with the four Vampire Brothers.

"My friends," Jack began to make his speech to the obviously curious citizens who huddled around to catch a glimpse of the potential new member. "I would like you all to meet Vladimir Vampire. He is the nephew of the Vampire Brothers, and he is here to help us make this Halloween even better than it was last year!" The townspeople cheered and the new Vampire, now identified as Vladimir, bowed slightly in a humble way.

"It is nice to be here in this town of Halloween." Vladimir stated in a soft, refine, yet manly tone, that had a hint of a Transylvanian accent.

The Creature from the Black Lagoon turned to Jewel and Corpse Mother and whispered, "Now there's a fine looking Vampire!"

"If I wasn't already married..." Corpse Mother began to say but didn't finish because her husband was not too far away and her son was by her side as well.

Jewel's eyes twinkled and a grin began to spread over her features. "Yes, a mighty fine Vampire indeed." The matchmaker inside of the blonde creature went off as she remembered what her and her daughter argued about the night before.

* * *

Speaking of the rag doll woman, she was still back at Oogie's lair, and was wide awake. Drumming her fingertips on the stone tiled floor, she laied on her stomach with an annoyed expression. It was about an hour or so ago that she was suppose to show up for work, yet she could not leave. 'Now I understand why he was making such a fuss over me last night.' Molly thought to herself dryly. 'He wanted to use me as a pillow**_ again_**.'

Indeed, this was true, especially since after Oogie knew for sure that Molly was in a deep enough sleep, he laid her on her stomach and rested his head upon her back. This was not the first or second time he did this to her, and by now she was quite use to it. The truth was, Oogie would make up any excuse or reason to make her stay and either entertain him longer, or on a few occasions, stay for a nap. He'd say something like, 'You look tired Doll Face, why don't you take a little rest...' and the next thing Molly knew, was that he only offered so he could get a few hours of sleep himself.

A very sneaky way to get his way, and for some reason Molly continued to forget that he was after all, the Boogie Man. A sadistic jerk by nature, and that hadn't changed even though they were friends. He would still get mad at her when he caught her cheating at card games, even when he was cheating more than her. Yep, that was Oogie Boogie, and even though his habits got on Molly's last nerve, she didn't want to change him. It would have been very odd if he had done all those nice things last night, without some other motive behind it.

Just as she was beginning to wonder how much longer the snoring sack would continue to sleep, a deep yawn escaped him. Sitting up and stretching his arms above his head, he sighed in a relaxed tone, "Ah, what a good night's rest."

"Mmmm I'm glad you thought so." the rag doll retorted in a sarcastic tone. Rolling to her back, she then sat up and saw the grin on Oogie's face when he turned to her; that smirk he always gave her when he did something he knew irritated her, and got such a joy from it.

"Didn't think I'd be **_that_** nice, now did you? Even I found it hard to stomach taking care of you." he told her with that irritating croon.

Yes, he liked to impress Molly with his lair, and to keep her around; even doing a few little things for her just to make her smile, but that was only because he liked it when she smiled. He also liked to annoy her to death. In the mere month they had been uneasy friends, he learned several things that were Molly's pet peeves. It was times like this, where he used 'kindness' to get what he wanted out of Molly, that he was sure he wasn't going down a path that would make him seem like a good guy. There were also times when he worried that he was losing his touch as the meanest guy in their world; especially since his next evil plan about how to get back at Jack, and perhaps even Sandy, were on a major hiatus. Keeping Molly around was his way of keeping himself out of the boredom spells he suffered from for about nine months after being sewn back by Lock, Shock, and Barrel.

Molly stood up and brushed some of the dust that was from the floor off the front of her dress, "For a moment, yeah, I guess I did." Once she was satisfied that her dress was decent looking, she began to walk towards the exit of his lair. "I have to get going though. Would have left awhile ago, but you're head was so heavy I couldn't."

"Just a moment Doll Face, you still owe me for letting you stay here, and for me having to be...nice..." he said the word with distaste, "...to you last night!" Folding his arms over his chest in an authoritative way, he continued, "I believe that deserves an all day visit."

"Unlike you, I actually have other duties to attend to." the rag doll responded and was about to leave until Oogie stood up and got in her way.

"Now that was a low blow there. You know, I spoil you way too much by letting you get away with those kinds of remarks, without having you visit Betsy." he told her with a slight glare. "I believe that calls for another favor, or just one big favor."

Favors were another thing these two argued over, since Oogie wasn't exactly a fair score keeper, and Molly didn't like about half the things he wanted to repay any 'favors' he did for her. "And just what is it you have in mind then?"

That mischievous grin spread across his face as he replied with an lecherous chuckle, "Today we play poker..." he then unfolded his arms and poked her collar bone, "...**_strip poker_**."

This wasn't the first time he suggested this. "How many times am I going to have to remind you that playing strip poker with you is unfair in so many ways?"

"Like I really care if it's fair?" Oogie shrugged.

Even though he said this, Molly began to list off the reasons she found it unfair. "First off, you don't even wear clothes, so I'd be the only one having anything at stake. Second, you're better at poker than I am, even when we're both cheating! And third..."

"Yes, yes, yes..." Oogie cut her off in mid sentence, nodding his head, but not really listening to her reasons. "...and just how many times do I have to keep reminding you, Doll Face, that I don't play fair?"

Knowing that he wouldn't move out of her way and continue to make her late for work, Molly sighed in resignation, "Fine Boogie, I'll play strip poker with you."

Assuming that she would continue her protest, Oogie responded, "I already said I..." then he realized that she didn't argue. "...wait what did you say?"

"I said I would play." she answered, causing the Boogie Man to grin widely until she added, "But..."

Uh-oh...there was a 'but'. There was always a, 'but' to whatever idea of his that she agreed to. Couldn't Molly just do as he told her to without there being a catch? That was one thing about her that was both admirable, and annoying. His grin fading and replaced by a glare of suspicion, Oogie asked reluctantly, "But what?"

Now it was Molly's turn to grin, "I'll play with you **_but_**, you're going to have to swear off cheating, **_and_**, you're going to have to lose some weight too. So that next time you decide to use me as your pillow I can at least move from under your head and get to work on time."

'GAH! SHE ALWAYS DOES THIS TO ME!' Oogie shouted mentally, as he pouted. "B-but that's not fair!" His statement was rather ironic, since he told Molly only a moment ago that he himself wasn't fair, yet expected her to be fair with him.

"Two unfairs make a fair." she told him with a chuckle, quoting his words to her from last week. "Isn't that what you told me?" Then an idea came to mind so she added, "Oh yeah, and if we ever do end up playing, you'd have to wear some kind of article of clothing to take off yourself." A chuckle escaped her as she thought of how unnecessary it was to add that, since Oogie would never quit cheating even if it was to save his life, and the same could be said about his size. "To be honest I don't know why you keep on wanting to play when you can't even strip."

Oogie already had an answer for her, with another deep suggestive chuckle, "I'm not the one interested in seeing strip."

Molly shook her head at him, "No wonder nobody lets you into town, since you run around naked all the time." she said with that teasing tone in her voice. "Not that you could really fit into clothes, so I can see why you don't wear any."

"Oh ha ha, forgive me for not wanting to play dress up like that pumpkin head, Jack Skellington." Oogie grumbled with narrowed eyes.

A giggle came from the raven haired doll woman as she patted Oogie's belly, "Like you'll ever get to be as skinny as Jack."

Annoyed that she was poking fun at his size, and comparing him to Jack, he pouted more as he folded his arms over his chest again. "If all you're going to do is mock me you'd might as well go back to town! I'll make you repay me later." Oogie then turned his head to the side to snub Molly.

"Fine, I was trying to leave anyways." Molly said with a shrug, noticing that he now stepped out of her way. Not very happy that he didn't get his way at the moment, Oogie didn't ask her when she would be back, as he usually did. Even so, Molly added, "I'll be seeing you later Boogie Man." When Oogie was still stubborn enough not to even return a word of parting, the rag doll left his lair and headed back to town.

* * *

Molly was not expecting her mother to be so welcoming when she came back home. Like the night before, she opened the door before Molly could reach the handle, and instead of the frown she was expecting, Jewel looked down right...excited, to see her. "Molly! There you are! I've been wondering when you would come back home!" she said in a cheery tone, which scared Molly more than a scream would have. Before she could even respond, Jewel took her hand and lead her inside, "We have a new Vampire living in our town, and he's been waiting all morning to meet you!"

As the confused rag doll was lead into the dinning room, the Vampire, Vladimir, was sitting at the table. 'By Lucifer this woman is very boring. The way she talks of her daughter non-stop is making me think that she's trying to pair us up. Ha, she's probably some vile looking thing. And not the good kind of vile either.' Vladimir thought to himself after Jewel left the room. When he heard her return, along with another set of feet walking upon the stone floor, he turned and gave the two a bored, eyes half open stare.

"Vladimir Vampire, I'd like you to meet my daughter, Molly." Jewel introduced, stepping away from Molly so that Vladimir could get a better look at her.

The rag doll woman glanced at her mother, and then looked forward at the Vampire sitting at the table. Judging from the look on his face, he didn't seem as enthusiastic about the meeting as her Mother was. He looked like a Vampire should, though his long, and wavy chestnut hair was different from the slicked back hair the Four Vampire Brothers. When he stood up, she was able to see that he was taller than she first expected, and Vladimir started to walk towards her.

Vladimir's red eyes only opened a little more when he saw Molly, since she wasn't as vile as he first thought, neither in a bad or good way. In fact, in his opinion she was rather plain looking. The only distinct features she had from the other rag doll whom was Jack's girlfriend, was her short black hair and green eyes. Then again, her dress looked a little better than Molly's, but it was still ripped and tattered at the bottom. However, she wouldn't be a total loss physically, if her wardrobe was changed, along with some other things. Holding out his hand, he said with a small smile, "It is nice to meet you, Holly."

"It's Molly." she corrected him, glancing at his hand without taking it.

"Molly," he repeated, before just taking her hand and shaking it, "pardon my slip of the tongue. I am not good with names after just recently learning them."

"Vladimir is the nephew of the Vampire Brothers!" Jewel explained to Molly as the two shook hands.

After shaking his hand several times, Molly slipped it out of his grasp, and looked him in the eyes. "Well, that's nice." She wasn't exactly sure what else to say to a total stranger, and she had a bad feeling that her mother was up to something.

Vladimir forgot her name again, so he instead chose not to use it when he spoke to her again, "Madam, would you care to perhaps show me around your town for a bit?" The reason he asked her, and not any of the other women in the town whom showed more interest in him than Molly did, even within a few seconds of meeting, was because she didn't seem as eager to please him. She seemed quiet too, something else that sparked his interest.

Since Molly would have rather not show someone around town, she quickly said, "I have to go back to work soon."

"Then perhaps later?" Vladimir asked, "Or perhaps tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow would be a fine day for Molly!" Jewel answered, before Molly could.

Molly's head turned to her mother, but before she could say anything to her, Vladimir spoke again, causing her to turn her attention back to him. "Good. Then I shall come by the house tomorrow in the morning then?"

"That would be fine. Perfect even. We look forward to seeing you then!" Jewel replied, and Vladimir took her answer, instead of listening to Molly's.

Taking his black and red umbrella, Vladimir nodded to the two Finkelstein women, "Then I best be going now. I am staying at my uncles' home in the residential area, in case perhaps you wish to come visit me during the last preparations of Halloween."

"Ah, we'll make sure to come visit you as well then." Jewel continued, before nudging Molly, "Perhaps then you should see him to the door, dear."

Not wanting to make a scene that was similar to the private one she had with her mother last night, Molly decided to do as she said, and walked with Vladimir to the front door. Opening his umbrella to shield himself from the rays of the morning sun, he took her hand again, but this time placed a kiss around the knuckles of her hand. "I look forward to tomorrow, Madam."

Once Vladimir left the Lab, Molly turned to her mother, "Okay, mother, why did you do that?"

Jewel looked surprised that Molly seemed unhappy, "I thought about what you said last night. Don't you think he'd make a fine suitor?"

"S-suitor!" Molly almost gagged on the word, since she wasn't exactly expecting her mother trying to match her up with a vampire when she returned home after the fight they had last night. "Why are you trying to pair me up all of a sudden?"

The blonde smiled, "Because, I'm showing you that I **_do_** listen to you. Just go out on this one date with him, you know he's the talk of the town now!"

"But I don't even know him!" Jewel's daughter replied with wide eyes. "What am I suppose to say?"

"Oh Molly please, if there's one thing you should learn about men, it is that you should listen to**_ them _**talk, and talk less about yourself." Jewel answered with the wave of her hand.

Not wanting to deal with her mother at the moment, the raven haired rag doll began to head up to the Experiment room where her father was almost all the time. "I'm going to go see father."

Jewel watched as Molly climbed up the rail to go see Dr. Finkelstein and sighed with a smile, "Poor dear is just nervous. I bet by tomorrow she'll be really pleased with my match making!"

* * *

"Hmmm..." Dr. Finkelstein began to rub his chin after Molly finished talking to him, informing the man in the wheelchair of what her mother set her up for. "Well I don't see what's the problem in going on a simple little date."

"It's not a date!" Molly tried to clarify, "I'm just showing him around the town since he's new. My point is, mom is always trying to force me into things that I don't want to do."

After tweaking what he was working on, Dr. Finkelstein turned his chair to face his daughter. Speaking in a more firm, explanatory way, he asked her, "Did I ever tell you the story behind your creation." Molly nodded, and he continued, "I made your mother almost one year ago, since that treacherous Sally wouldn't even do her simple chores. Of course, she is my ideal woman, but I am also a very busy man. Getting lonely, Jewel wanted company. She wanted a daughter, and so, I made you."

Molly sighed, "What does that have to do with this though?"

"What I am trying to tell you is, that maybe you shouldn't always go against what your mother says." her father responded, "I know you're at that age, and it's only natural for you to disagree. Although, Jewel is your mother, and I made you so that the two of you could bond. Maybe if you compromised, you would both be more happy."

"In other words, you want me to give this guy a chance too, right?" the rag doll asked reluctantly. Dr. Finkelstein nodded, and finally, Molly sighed in resignation. "Alright, I'll do this." As she left her father's experiment room, she then remembered her daily visits to Oogie. For a moment she worried if he would become upset by her absence tomorrow. Even though they were friends for about a month, it was still only a short time, and he could still consider doing something to take her hostage at his lair for the rest of her days if he felt the need to do so. Then she thought, 'Well, it's only one day, I'll just say that I couldn't get out to see him. He'll understand.'

* * *

The next day, Molly spent the good part of the day showing Vladimir around Halloween town, and already knew that she didn't want to go on a real date with him. All the vampire did was talk of how simple the town seemed to be, or bragged about himself, which got old fast. Luckily for her, the tour was over before nightfall, so Molly planned to go see Oogie for a short while. However, it seemed that fate was against her.

"What do you mean you can't open the gate?" Molly asked in exasperation.

The Clown who was never seen off of his unicycle, who was also the keeper of the main gate key, responded, "Not suppose ta let anyone, or anything in or outta tha city for the next week or so." Clown paused for a moment, and before Molly could ask why, he added, "The Mayor and Jack are working on some special plan for Halloween, and didn't want them three troublemakers, you know, Lock, Shock, and Barrel, to ruin anything."

"And you're not going to let me pass, are you?" Molly asked, sounding as if she already knew that she had been defeated. Clown nodded, and Molly sighed. As she walked back to the Laboratory, she said to herself, "Well, I'll just go visit him in a week. It's not like he's expecting me anytime soon. I said later, but I never said how much later." Little did she know, that the next two weeks, her mother and Vladimir would keep her preoccupied, leaving her with little time to think of her burlap sack friend.

* * *

Although Oogie hadn't been so busy during those two weeks, in fact, he was bored each day. While she was gone, Oogie got a taste of what life was like before Molly, and remembered how dull the days were. He got so bored, and desperate for something to do, he was willing to interact with anyone. "Okay you brats," Oogie began as he, and his three henchmen stood before him in his game room. "This is how the game is played." Picking up a ball that was a solid, and one that had a stripe on it. "There are two colored balls in Pool. It doesn't matter which ball you, or I hit. If it goes into one of the pockets, then the person who hit it gets the point. If you get a ball into one of the pockets, you get another two turns. Do any of you understand the rules?"

Even Barrel could tell that Oogie's rules for Pool were not the correct ones. "Wait Mr. Oogie Boogie, I don't think that's how the game goes." He spoke up in a soft tone, trying not to get Oogie mad, since he had become even more irritable than usual in the past two weeks that Molly had been away.

Glaring at Barrel for questioning his rules, Oogie asked, "Oh? Would you like to show me the **_right_** way then, Barrel!"

"N-no." Barrel responded in a nervous stutter.

Lock then decided to speak as Barrel took a few steps away from Oogie for fear of his wrath. "What's the point of playing Pool when you're the only one who can reach the table, Boss?" he asked in a smart aleck tone of voice. Since they introduced Oogie to Molly, the Boogie man had been a little more lenient with the trio, causing Lock to develop a bad habit of giving Oogie attitude.

"BECAUSE I SAID!" answered Oogie with a yell.

"Can't we play something else though?" Shock asked, using a more humble tone than Lock had as she shot the devil boy a mean glare to warn him against further angering their boss.

Oogie glared more at the three before an evil grin fell upon his features. "Perhaps you three would have more fun playing hide and go shriek with Betsy again?"

Lock and Shock's eyes widened for a moment in fright, while Barrel, who was oblivious to the conversation, as he tried to reach the pool table by jumping up and down. "L-let's not." Shock replied in a soft tone.

"Is there any way to make the table shorter so we can reach it?" the shortest Boogie Boy asked, as he continued his relentless effort to see over the table.

Growling in irritation, Oogie picked Barrel up finally, and placed him down on the edge of the pool table. After staring down at the boy, who stared back into his empty sockets, he sighed rubbing his head with the tip of his hand. "Ah! Forget it! It's too easy anyway." Wanting some time to himself, he stormed out of the game room, forgetting that he left Barrel sitting up on the table.

Barrel stared down at the more than five foot difference between him and the ground, and gulped, while Lock began the blame game with Shock. "This is all your fault!" he declared, pointing at the little witch.

"How is it my fault?" Shock demanded, as she bared her teeth at Lock in anger.

"You were the one who introduced Oogie to Molly!" answered Lock.

"Was not! Barrel was the idiot who mentioned her to him!" Shock responded as she began to advance towards Lock, showing the beginning stages of a fight.

Barrel watched as the two exchanged glares and spoke up in a softer tone, trying not to interrupt. "Um...can one of you guys help me down from here?"

Lock acted as if he didn't hear Barrel, as he pushed Shock down once she got into his face. "Well it was your idea to get Oogie to like her!"

He was then greeted with a hard kick to the face from Shock's boot. After he fell over, holding his jaw, Shock stood up again, sneering, "Well you mouthing off to the boss isn't helping him go easier on us either! It was your fault that all day yesterday we played, 'survivor', with his stupid, hungry, spider!"

The two continued their fight with no more words, and more punches and kicks, while Barrel watched. He was glad that he hadn't decided to try and jump down, and get caught up in their fight, or become their new target. The jade haired boy took notice when Oogie stormed back in, and judging by the look on his face, he wanted to speak to all three of them. Barrel stared at Oogie for awhile, then glanced down at his brawling cohorts, and then back at Oogie, who still had the same look on his face. Turning around, he picked up the black eight ball, and held it over both Lock and Shock's heads. After dropping it, the heavy pool ball slammed against their skulls, and caused them to stop their fight. Before they were able to yell at Barrel though, they both suddenly realized that their boss was standing over them, waiting to get their attentions.

Now that all three of the children were paying attention to him, Oogie announced in an curt tone, "I want you guys to go find that friend of yours. I need to speak with her. Go see why she hasn't shown up lately. Now get moving!"

"Yes sir!" Lock and Shock replied obediently.

"But before we go, can you get me down from here?" Barrel asked in a weak tone of voice, trying not to upset Oogie anymore than he already was with his question. The burlap terror sighed, before he picked up Barrel and placed him down on his feet again, then pointed to the exit of the room. Taking the hint, Barrel then began to run out of the room, but not before falling once on his face, allowing Lock and Shock to run past him first.

* * *

The trio came back to Oogie's lair after an hour passed, and they were not happy with the news they had received. When they got to the gate, Clown told them to get lost, and when they caught sight of Molly with a vampire's arm wrapped around her shoulder, they knew it was bad. Clown told them that the two had been seeing each other for the past two weeks, and that vampire, Vladimir, had been taking her out almost every night. This would not sit well with Oogie. Even if Oogie didn't consider Molly his girl, the children knew how possessive Oogie was, and in his mind, they knew their boss thought that Molly belonged to him.

"Okay Shock, you're going to tell Oogie everything, right?" Lock asked as they entered Oogie's torture chamber.

Shock looked alarmed, "I sure as heck ain't gonna do it!"

"Well I don't want to either!" Lock growled, but then got an idea. Looking at Barrel, then at Shock, then back at Barrel again, he suddenly raised his arm up in the air, high above his head. "All in favor of making Barrel tell Oogie the news, raise your hand!"

Right after hearing this, Shock immediately shoved her hand up in the air, causing Barrel to jump back. "Hey! That's not fair!" he complained.

"Two against one." stated Lock with a smug grin.

Shock then added with an grin of her own, since she was glad she didn't get stuck with the job. "Majority rules."

"Y-yeah," Barrel admitted, nervous now, "But Oogie's going to be really mad when he finds out." The shorter boy had been walking backwards away from them, when he suddenly bumped into something. Looking up, he realized it was the same person he was just mentioning.

"What did you find out that would make me mad!" Oogie's loud voice echoed off the walls in his outrage as he demanded an answer.

At the same time, Lock, Shock, and Barrel jumped in surprise, and Barrel ran back to their side. The boy dressed like a devil was the first brave soul to respond, "Well, um, that is to say Boss, what I mean is...Barrel wants to tell you!" He then took several steps back to get away from Barrel, with Shock also doing the same, leaving poor Barrel to be put on the spot with Oogie yet again.

"Well um, I...uh..." Barrel tried to find his voice, since he was both scared of Oogie's wrath, and angry with Lock, and Shock for always sticking him with the least favored work. Saying the first thing that came to his mind, he finally said, "Y-you're, you're...you're really tall."

"I KNOW THAT!" shouted Oogie as he glared down at the boy dressed like a skeleton. "WHAT I WANT YOU TO TELL ME IS WHAT I **_DON'T_** KNOW!"

Shouting the news out bluntly, since Barrel wanted to get it over with, he said quickly, almost all in one sentence. "She's been seein' a new guy, named Vladimir!"

There was an eerie, and unsettling silence between the four of them for a very long time. Barrel stood there, cringing as he expected for Oogie's booming voice to start screaming at him, but when he was met with only silence, the short boy blinked his eyes, then looked back up at Oogie with a curious expression. Just as the three children began to wonder if Barrel's words fazed him, the Boogie man let out a fierce yell that could be heard all the way outside of the tree house if anyone had been wondering by. "SHE'S WHAT!" This caused Lock, Shock, and Barrel to jump three feet into the air from the sudden break of silence, and the three scattered to hide behind Oogie's contraptions in case the giant burlap sack wished to use his torture devices on them in his rage. Though, Oogie seemed more thoughtful, and frustrated, than angry. He glared as he began to pace the room, feverously muttering to himself. "Vladimir. She's seeing Vladimir." Pausing his speech and movement, he asked quizzically to nobody in particular, "Wait, who **_is_** Vladimir anyway?"

Lock decided to take a chance, and answer Oogie's question this time, "He's some Vampire. Think he's related to the four Vampire Brothers."

"Apparently he's been taking out Molly almost every day." Shock added, also feeling a little bolder; she even peeked out behind Oogie's iron maiden.

Barrel then said thoughtfully, though he didn't poke his head out from his hiding place, "He's tall too…" Of course, one would wonder what use this bit of information was to their boss.

When a deep growl came out of the Boogie man, Lock hissed over to Barrel, "You idiot! Stop talking about how tall people are!"

Shock emerged from behind the iron maiden now, feeling more confident to face the foreboding Oogie Boogie. "Clown told us that a lot of the women in town think he's just to die for. And that he's probably got a fancy for Molly, since he spends most of his time with her for the past two weeks."

Barrel now decided to poke out his head and state, "His nose is pointy, and so is his big chin."

Vampire? With a pointy nose, and big pointy chin? With a fancy for Molly? All this information was only making Oogie's anger about the whole situation rise, and he was unaware of the soft growl that began in his throat until it grew steadily louder until he shouted at his henchmen, "GAH! THAT'S ENOUGH! GET-OUT-NOW!" They didn't need to be told more than once. Almost at once Lock, Shock, and Barrel ran past Oogie; the tapping of their feet lead deeper into his lair until he could hear their birdcage elevator lift them out if his lair, and up to their playroom at the top of the tree house.

Muttering under his breath, Oogie continued to pace around, thinking over what he just found out. 'That little tease! She's supposed to come visit me everyday! How else am I suppose to be entertained throughout these long, boring, torturous days!' Then, he suddenly stopped his pacing again. A wonderful idea crossed his mind. A slow, sadistic grin began to creep its way onto his face; a grin he missed making. "Heh, heh, heh, heh…" he began to chuckle darkly before he began a monologue to himself. "Torture! That's exactly what I should do! I'll get those brats to lure this ignorant vampire to my lair, and then, I show him exactly why they call me, the BOOGIE MAN! BAHAHAHAHA!" Oogie then broke out into an insane fit of laughter, as he finalized the rest of his brilliant plan to get rid of this interference.

* * *

Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun! Oh noes! Oogie's planning to torture Vladimir! Pftt! Like we care! Or maybe some of you do like Vlad. I dunno…anyways, who said the vamp will take it without a fight. Ooooh. Welp, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. I know you've been wondering when Oogie was going to go back to his usual evil ways after the last few chapters of being nice, but I didn't wanna ruin it for you by explaining everything to you before this chapter. Hope it cleared some things up about Oogie and Molly's relationship as of yet. And no, Oogie's not in love, he just doesn't like to share his favorite doll's attention.

I'd like to thank the following for their reviews:

SexySaiyanSakura

The Narrator

Quillian91

Moonliterider

Marissa

Queen Freaky

PyroManiac198

Hearts Aglow

Jack's Sweetie

Megan

UnCanon

Thank you for all of your reviews! I'd also like to especially thank The Narrator for pointing out some of the mistakes I've made in previous chapters. I've corrected them in my document on the computer, however, I'll need to go back and fix them on later on, when I'm not too tired. But there were some things you pointed out that were actually fine. Such as, I know what to do with ! and ? marks, it's just sometimes I use both to show exasperation, and takes away the one that comes after it, so sometimes it looks out of place. But now I noticed that it does that so I put the ? or the ! mark first. And also, I've been using the right manner, since a manor is a house.

Anyways, I hope all you past reviewers, and you new guys reading giving the fic a chance, and are reading it for the first time enjoyed the chapter! I really enjoy seeing your honest opinions, and reading praise, as well as constructive criticisms.

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	9. VIII: Kidnap the Vampire

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly, and Vladimir, but that's it folks!

Quick Author's Note: Special thanks to my super duper helpers, Raptured Night (formerly known as SexySaiyanSakura) and Marissa for all their help during this chapter, especially with the rhyming for Lock, Shock, and Barrel's short Kidnap the Vampire song. And a special thanks to you patient reviewers for waiting so long for me to finally update with this chapter! Enjoy :D

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Chapter Eight: Kidnap the Vampire

As Oogie began to laugh insanely, Lock, Shock, and Barrel gathered around the opening of the chute that lead down to Oogie's torture chamber, listening to their boss' laughter. This wouldn't have normally worried them, except for the fact that Oogie hadn't laughed like that in a very long time, and also because of the recent news they brought to him. "Think he's gone mad?" asked Barrel curiously after Oogie ceased his laughter.

Now instead of laughing, he was coughing, and the burlap sack muttered to himself, "Being evil is hard on the windpipe."

"I think he has…" Shock replied to Barrel.

Lock gave them both a quizzical look before presenting an argument, just for the reason to argue. "What do you mean? He's always talked to himself."

The sudden yell from the chute scared all three of the children so much that they all jumped at least a foot up in the air. "BOYS! GET DOWN HERE! NOW!" Ordered Oogie, addressing the children. Despite the fact that Shock was a girl, she knew that he meant for her to join Lock and Barrel as well, since she was part of 'Oogie's boys'.

Once the juveniles were once again standing in front of their master, they all asked at the same time, "Y-yes Mr. Oogie Boogie?"

At first when they came down to see him, Oogie had been tapping his foot impatiently as he waited for them to come see him, but now he began to grin in a wicked way as he rubbed the points of his arms, which were the closest things he had to hands, together in the way villains have been known to do. "I have a little job for the three of you to do. And I want it done tonight."

Upon seeing this behavior of their boss, Lock, Shock, and Barrel began to look intrigued. This was more like the old Oogie that they both feared, yet also adored in the fact that he rivaled their own sadistic natures. "Oooh! What kind of job?" asked all three of Oogie's henchmen.

Oogie motioned for them to come closer, and immediately they scurried over, unable to hide their excitement, and curiosity about the new job. Speaking lowly to them, Oogie explained, "You're gonna get me this Vladimir fellow. I think it's time we had a little heart-to-heart talk."

All of them knew exactly that Oogie didn't want to talk to Vladimir, and this continued to intrigue the children. "Ooooh!" Lock said with a wide grin.

"So you want us to…" Shock began, and then allowed Barrel to finish the sentence.

"…Kidnap the vampire?" finished Barrel with a wide smile plastered on his face as well.

Oogie smirked evilly as he replied, "Isn't that what I said?" Now that it was confirmed, the children were joyous in this new mission, since they all turned to smile at each other before giving their boss their own evil grins to show their own approval for Oogie's choice. After watching the three clamor a bit with mischievous cackles, he added, "Well what are you waiting for? Get going!"

Barrel jumped up and down with cynical glee before he asked Oogie, "Can we use some of your skeletons?"

"Well," Oogie began; looking thoughtful for a while, but then shrugged it off. "Oh, why not? As long as you bring him here alive, I don't care what you do to him! So go off, and have fun. But if you kill him before I get a chance to, I'll make sure to give you three the, 'talk' I had planned for him!"

"Of course," the children replied in unison before they began to cackle again, setting off to find a few of Oogie's skeletons to help them on their newest assignment. As they left, Oogie Boogie himself began to rub his hands together, before he began his preparations for Vladimir's arrival.

XxXxXxXxX

Speaking of Vladimir Vampire, he was currently escorting Molly back to the Finkelstein Laboratory Tower. The raven-haired rag doll was quite glad when he finally said his farewell, since the past two weeks had been boring, at least when she was on these, 'dates' as her mother insisted to call them. Molly on the other hand, would have preferred to call them several hours of wasted time. Sure, Vladimir had some attractive qualities, but good looks never impressed her very much. Being a con artist, she knew that appearances could be very deceiving at times, and in Vladimir's case, this was very true. Many of the women thought he was tall, pale, and mysterious; the strong silent type. However, Vladimir was quite talkative, if of course, the topic was himself, or something that centered around him.

Molly wanted badly to refuse his invitations out, but her mother insisted she go for, "her own good". When on those dates, Molly kept quiet, and barely spoke her own mind, since she just didn't feel like opening herself up to Vladimir. There was just nothing she could discuss with him, it seemed. Every night she found herself gazing out of the window in her room at the locked gate with emerald hues filled with longing. Nothing about those dates with Vladimir pleased her, not even the unique evening gowns her mother had made for her to wear on them, each made by Sally. As usual though, Jewel didn't catch on to her daughter's unhappiness, thinking that she just didn't like the change, and that she would get use to Vladimir sooner or later.

As she changed out of one of her several dresses, and into her dark green nightgown, which came down to her thighs, her eyes seemed to cast their gaze past the plaza and at the iron gates that held her captive in her town. Once she hung her dress in her closet, she plopped on the patched, and practically moth-eaten mattress, to gaze past the gates of Halloween Town to the darkness of the grave yard, and Spiral Hill, which looked like a mere speck in the distance. Past that hill, through the thick grouping of trees was where Lock, Shock, and Barrel's tree house stood, and Oogie's lair hidden beneath it.

Oogie Boogie was the biggest jerk Molly had ever met, and throughout their strange friendship which had lasted for the past month or so, she wondered why she even continued to sneak out to see him, refusing to mention her relationship to the Boogie man to anyone. Now, after these past two weeks of being deprived of these visits, she knew why she continued to see the ornery sack of bugs. Despite all of Oogie's bad qualities, Molly preferred his company to Vladimir's. It was that simple, and Molly couldn't wait till the gates were lifted, and she'd be able to see the Boogie man once again.

Moments after Molly turned her head away from her window to go to bed, Vladimir began to walk across the plaza. Unknown to the vampire, Lock, Shock, and Barrel were watching him stroll towards the residential area. "There's the guy," Lock whispered to a skeleton next to him, which was one of four the gruesome threesome took with them. "Two of you nab him, then you two, throw him into this bag!"

Shock cackled softly, sounding very much like a witch, "I hope he likes garlic."

"'Cause this bag reeks of it!" Barrel stated, as he pulled out a bag that wasn't their usual trick-or-treat bag that they had used when kidnapping Santa. This one was a large sack that had once held the garlic Oogie used in his cooking. Their boss was more than willing to part with it for their cause.

The four skeletons could not really speak, aside from scream in a blood curdling way, but they did acknowledge their orders, by heading forward. However, soon they ran into a problem, quite literally.

The children began to watch with mild interest, as the confused, yet determined skeletons continued to try and go after their target, but kept walking into the iron gates that lead into the town.

Realizing that Vladimir was getting away, Shock spoke up again, "We got to find a way to sneak into town."

"What we need to do is get this darn gate open," Lock added.

Barrel, who took notice of a slumbering Clown, suddenly got an idea, which involved throwing the bones of one of the skeletons through the bars of the gate. This idea was useful, and fun for them all to pick apart a skeleton, which could rebuilt itself again anyways once it was fully thrown into the town. Once this skeleton was on the other side of the gate, it then stole the key to open the gate.

All while this was happening not too far away from him, Vladimir seemed oblivious to it all. Instead of paying attention to his surroundings, he was too preoccupied with his own thoughts of the day. Molly sure wasn't the golden prize, but she was tolerable, and would most likely make for a good wife, as long as she stayed the way she was; pleasant, and interested in him. He was quite glad that she wasn't too chatty about herself, it made for less boring conversations, at least on his part.

Just before he could continue his thoughts, he found that something, or more like somethings, were grabbing onto his arms, preventing him from continuing towards the residential area. Snapping his head to glare at the fiends who dared to mess with him, he then looked into the empty sockets of the skeletons that were at Lock, Shock, and Barrel's command. The moment Vladimir took to raise a brow in puzzlement was all the children needed to throw their sack over the vampire.

"The bag's not big enough to hold him," Lock complained, noticing that the bag didn't cover all of his body while in the standing position he was in. Of course, Vladimir struggled as two other skeletons began to use the rope they brought along to tie the vampire's body against the bag he was currently inside of.

"Why you miserable brats! You'd best let me out right this instant if you don't wish to face my rage! It smells like…ugh GARLIC! IT BURRRRNNS!" Vladimir cried out, though his voice was muffled against the fabric of the sack.

Lock, Shock, and Barrel began to grin in cynical delight as they heard the vampire's pain filled voice coming from the bag. Glancing back over to Clown, to see if he was still asleep, and seeing that he still was, they began to chuckle deviously. As soon as the skeletons finished pushing their captive into the walking bathtub, the children wasted no time in climbing in as well, not caring if their feet happened to crush into the stomach, nose, or any other parts of Vladimir as they did.

Once they were safe on the other side of the gate, which they had the skeletons close behind them, Lock, Shock, and Barrel began to sing a new song, that had the same tune they normally sang with while running around doing mischief, only this song included lyrics about kidnapping a certain vampire.

_La la la la la la la la la  
La la la la la!  
La la la la la la la la  
La la la la la la la!_

_Kidnap the vampire, toss him in the sun  
Watch him run around a while,  
Boy won't that be fun!_

Shock then began to sing her solo, "First we had to figure out how to open the gate, to get closer to this ingrate. We knew he'd try to struggle and fight, so we brought some help, much to his fright!"

Lock's solo was next, "Now that we've got him in our hands, let's take him near the Hinter Lands. To Oogie's hideout we shall go, so he can exterminate this foe!"

Kidnap the vampire,  
Leave him in this bag.  
Watch him squirm around, and cry  
Then we'll laugh when he starts to gag!

Shock smirked at Lock, before crooning, "Then Mr. Oogie Boogie Man…"

Together, the witch and devil sang, "Can take the whole thing over then."

He'll be so pleased we do declare,  
You really should have been aware!  
Wheeeeeeee

The whole trip to the trio's club house, and through out their song, Vladimir wondered to himself dryly, 'Great…I've been kidnapped by three children…Jack Skellington is going to hear an earful about this once I get out of this degrading situation!' The vampire was quite grateful when their song came to an end, and the walking tub come to an end, but the feeling of relief was only momentary. Since now, Lock, Shock, and Barrel began to stuff him into an opening that wasn't big enough for him to fit through.

"He's too big!" Shock's raspy little voice complained, as she glared at Lock.

"Hey, if we could fit Sandy down here, then anything can go down this chute!" Lock responded in a self assured tone, before he continued to push their captive more into the opening of the chute that lead to Oogie's lair with a grunt.

With a lot of elbow grease effort from all three of the children, they eventually got their captive vampire nicely shoved all the way into the chute, and now Vladimir was sliding down head first through the long pipes that eventually would send him to Oogie's lair. When he reached the end of the not so comfortable ride, the disgruntled Vladimir landed on his stomach hard into the new area. Still trapped within the bag that once held garlic, he could not see anything. After cutting into the bag with his claws, he was finally able to free himself from his horrible smelling prison. All around him was darkness, but it only took his eyes mere seconds to adjust to the darkness. Faint outlines of strange looking contraptions were about him, and he felt on edge.

"Ugh, what rude children!" he complained to himself, straightening out his robes. "I'd like to know who neglected to teach those rotten things manners!"

An amused, and villainous chuckle came from the darkness, before a deep, jazzy voice said to him, "That would be me."

Turning to where his sensitive hearing detected the source of the mysterious voice, Vladimir could not see who it was, since it seemed they were still in hiding. "And just who are you?" he inquired, glancing around the darkness, eying every corner with suspicious scrutiny.

Now the voice seemed to come from all directions, in a booming volume, "I am the shadow on the moon at night, filling your dreams to the brim of fright!" which was soon followed by maniacal laughter.

"How very arrogant of you to say," Vladimir commented dryly, to cover up how unnerved he was by his yet to be seen threat. "And quite vague about your identity as well! Just was business do you have with me anyways? Since I'm quite sure it was you who sent your demon minions to bring me here."

Another dark chuckle escaped the other in the room, "My, you catch on quick."

"Answer me!" Vladimir demanded now, getting tired of how the other person kept avoiding his questions.

"You're in no position to be giving **me **orders, Fang Boy," the male voice replied with a deep chortle. Moments later, lights were suddenly turned on for the giant roulette table Vladimir was currently standing on. It was then, when the most sadistic, twisted, and selfish man in all of Halloween stepped into the light, glowing in his neon green glory. A proud smirk was upon Oogie Boogie's face as he continued to explain, "Because you're now prisoner of the Boogie Man!"

After glancing around at his newly revealed surroundings, having recovered from the blinding neon lights that suddenly blinded him, Vladimir quickly took in the area, before glowering at the massive sack foe. "You're the Boogie Man?" he asked in a skeptical tone, wrinkling his nose in distaste. "I highly doubt that, since one would have to be quite intimidating for such an important title. And quite frankly, you just don't seem very intimidating."

"You won't be sayin' that for too long, Vladdy," Oogie replied with a smirk, enjoying the banter.

"It seems you are also cannot understand how to answer questions as a part of civil behavior," added Vladimir, obviously not amused by the whole situation.

A croon came from Oogie as he responded, "No, just don't want to answer them."

A frustrated growl finally escaped Vladimir that showed that he had already lost his patience with Oogie. "Then I'm afraid I'm going to have to make you answer with force!"

Oogie pretended to be frightened, "Ooooh!" he crooned again to mock him, "I'm terrified, you got me shakin'!" Laughing deviously, he then reached over to a lever next to him, and pulled it, causing the giant roulette table to start turning, causing the unprepared vampire to stumble from the sudden motion. Again Oogie laughed when Vladimir glared at him from where he stood, no longer trying to advance towards him. "Watch your step," he warned with a knowing grin.

Another growl came from Vladamir's throat, "Just what kind of game is this!" he demanded to know after regaining his balance on the moving platform.

"Hehe, my favorite kind," Oogie replied with a short chuckle, before pulling out some rather large dice bombs. "And lemme tell you Fang Boy, I enjoy all games, and no matter what, Oogie Boogie always wins!"

"And just what game is this one, exactly?" Vladimir asked, eyeing Oogie cautiously, as well as the rather oversized dice.

Leaning on one of his dice, Oogie replied casually, moving one of his pointed hands as he talked, "It's a game with quite a simple concept to it really." Smirking, and looking quite smug, feeling the old rush of pleasure he got from being cynical. "You see, I keep torturing you with all my Oogie toys, until you agree to…" he trailed off on purpose, then suddenly changed his tone, mood, and expression. Now he was dangerously serious, and narrowed his eye sockets in an irritated glare before sounding out each word with great emphasis, and a slightly possessive growl, "…**stop seeing Molly**!"

Vladimir's scowl was soon replaced by one of curiosity, "Molly?" he asked slightly puzzled. It took him a few moments to remember the raven haired rag doll that Oogie was referring to, then got back to being defensive, "Just what does she have to do with this?"

Oogie couldn't help but throw his head back, and laugh at the vampire's question. He laughed for a while, very hard, until he began his reply in the tone he was using to bait Vladimir earlier, "Okay, maybe you don't catch on as quickly as I thought before." Moving his head back into place so he could lock his empty sockets with the crimson gaze of the nuisance, he again changed his tone back to a soft, yet deadly serious one, "**Everything**."

For a while the pale vampire in black robes thought to himself in silence, 'Just what in the name of all that is undead is this man? Her crazy uncle? Or perhaps…' A sudden thought occurred to him that made him pause his mental conversation, and it was so clear to him now. Grinning now, as if he knew something Oogie didn't, he clarified, "Oh I see now, you're Molly's jealous stalker!"

"**Jealous**?" Oogie repeated, taken aback, and clearly appalled by Vladimir's accusation. Glaring even more than before, Oogie began to deny the claims, "I am no-" but then he suddenly stopped speaking. Remembering that this was not the time to lose his temper, especially to someone who, in his opinion, wasn't even worth having to explain the odd, yet fairly simple relationship between Molly, and him. "If I was in your position, I'd hope I wouldn't be jealous," he corrected with a sneer.

"Judging from your first outburst, I'd say I hit the bat's eye!" the lifeless lips of Vladimir began to curl in a smug grin, as he suddenly found the reason why he was brought here.

A dark, but brief laugh escaped the Boogie Man, "Hardly! Molly just entertains me, and since you've been buttin' in on my time, hoggin' up all of hers, I thought I'd give you one fair warning, before I ran out of town, or kill you. Whichever option fate, or luck decides to give you! Bwahahaha!"

Vladimir gave a laugh back, though his was haughtier, "Ha! So you are jealous! Jealous that some **plain** rag doll woman would rather spend her time with someone like me, instead of someone like you. Of course, it's understandable just by looking at you. You look as if children sewed you together in the dark! It's also quite sad how you have to threaten me just so you can get whatever little precious attention she once gave to you, that she'd rather give to, well, me. It's downright pathetic!"

As Vladimir began to not only insult him, but also called Molly 'plain', it got on Oogie's nerves. It wasn't that he wanted to defend Molly, it was more along the lines that Vladimir was insulting what he considered his. To insult Molly, would be to insult Oogie's taste, and nobody disrespected Oogie's taste! Nobody who didn't suffer the consequences anyways. Not showing his anger, he merely covered it up with a smirk before making a quip, "So is your accent," he shrugged casually before adding with a cool air for someone who had just been insulted, "but hey, nobody's perfect."

"Most especially not you!" Vladimir retorted.

"Oh ouch, that stung," Oogie said sarcastically before grinning once again with an evil glow to his presence that burned like the neon color upon his burlap body. "As much fun as this conversation is, I didn't really bring you here for a chat. I had you brought here so we can reach an agreement, after some good ol' fashioned torture!" Without another word, the notorious Boogie Man tossed the dice bombs down upon the roulette table where Vladimir was standing.

The explosion caused the vampire to be thrown back, since he was not expecting that sort of offensive attack. Nor could he anticipate the rows of cards with the King of Spades designed on them, to suddenly have working arms that opened at their sides with very real knives to twirl around to slice his body into so many little pieces. Backing away from the deadly cards that wielded knives, Vladimir backed into the middle of the Roulette table he was standing on, though when he felt, and heard the metallic sound of spikes emerge from the sides of the Roulette table's top, he flinched just in time to keep his back from receiving a painful wound, but his robes were not so lucky, as the sharp spike that would have impaled him in the back tore a hole in his clothing.

Upon seeing the damage done to his clothing, a frown of horror crossed pale features, as the Vampire seemed to be upset by his now ruined outfit, acting as if this were as big a tragedy as it would have been if his back were pierced. "Y-you ruined my clothes!" he said in disbelief.

"Sorry, I meant to get your body," Oogie replied with a casual air, before shrugging. "Guess I'll just have to try harder." Pulling another lever that he had waddled over to while Vladimir was preoccupied, the whirring of more machines began to add to the other sounds of working machines that were already in use. "Buzz saw!" he cried out in sadistic glee, feeling like being a little generous, and giving Vladimir a heads up to what he should expect to come flying his way.

As if dodging not one, but two buzz saws that glowed a blinding yellow and neon blue were not enough to freak Vladimir out, the side of the table that he had his back turned to now lifted up, revealing three slots men, whom had the very real guns in their hands. Upon hearing the clanking sounds they made as they began to come forward, the Vampire watched with wide eyes, unsure of what to expect from these contraptions. Upon Oogie's command to fire, the mechanical men began to shoot their guns, making Vladimir dodge from the small bullets, trying so hard not to get hit with one of the bullets. Once they were done, and receded back to their hiding place, Oogie began to throw a few more dice bombs down at the Vampire, starting over in the torture's cycle.

The Boogie Man kept this routine up until Vladimir could no longer stand from fatigue. Though he was a vampire, Vladimir was more or less, not the most active of all, so he wasn't very keen on the whole dodging to survive thing. Oogie felt that now was a good time to ask the exhausted captive again, if he felt that it was wiser to stay away from his rag doll now. Jumping down to be on the platform, as the whirring sounds of his contraptions died down after being shut down, Oogie advanced towards a panting Vladimir. "Gee, that was a lot of fun, wasn't it Vladdy ol' boy?"

After having a burlap hand slapped hard against his back, Vladimir fell over onto his knees, before hissing at his captor, "Perhaps it was for you!"

"Well, you know I've always got other toys that have a more deadly appeal to them," Oogie began with a contemplative tone about his statement, his sockets lingering upon the Iron Maiden that seemed to call out to him. "However, you look a little tired. You can go home if you just agree to stay as far away from Molly Finkelstein as you possibly can."

Knowing well that he would not stand another round of dodging deadly objects, Vladimir reluctantly nodded in agreement. "Alright, alright, you win Boogie Man," he admitted verbally between his husky breaths for air. "I'll stay away from your precious, **plain**, rag doll."

Not liking how Vladimir intentionally added plain to the description of Molly, Oogie clapped his burlap hands together to beckon two other skeletons that glowed blue in his lair over to him. "You two, take Fang Boy out of here through the Magma Maze."

"T-the what?" cried Vladimir in a high-pitched way, reminding one of a pubescent girl before the skeletal henchmen carried him away. Struggling in their grasp, the now very upset vampire was not going to leave without saying one more thing. "Oh Oogie!" After gaining the burlap sack's attention, he grinned, and recited some very odd words, "Regurgitious organious!"

Oogie only raised one of his brows with a quizzical look on his face, but as the nuisance was being carried away from his sights, he shrugged it off, thinking of it no more.

XxXxXxXxXxXxX

Meanwhile, back in town, a very distressed Clown figured out that someone had taken his key to open the main gate, and though they were closed, they were not locked. Immediately he hurried on his unicycle to find Jack, knowing that the Pumpkin King would need to know what to do. At the moment, he and Jack were now looking around the plaza to see if the key was somewhere in sight.

"Are you sure someone took the key, and you didn't just misplace it?" asked Jack after removing his hand from the fountain, making sure that someone didn't throw it into the green water.

Clown nodded vigorously, "Yeah, positive. And someone must have done it to unlock the gate!" Hanging his head, and letting his shoulders slump over, Clown lamented, "I'm so sorry Jack, it's all my fault that the key to the Main Gate is lost now."

Placing a kind bony hand on Clown's shoulder to reassure him that he was not in anyway disappointed in him, Jack replied, "Don't worry Clown. I'm sure it's not that far. I get the feeling it might have been those three troublemakers. The whole point of keeping the town on lock down was to keep them out from underfoot. Guess even the gate can't keep them away. As soon as we find the key, I say we should reopen the gate. The Mayor was saying that a few ghouls were complaining about how they couldn't venture out into the graveyard anyways."

Something then caught his empty eyes, and the skeleton man noticed that there was something metallic that caught the light of the moon. "Oh!" he declared, before walking over to the gate, and reaching his hand effortlessly between the barred gate, and plucking the key from the cobblestone. "Why, look here, the key was on the other side of the gate this whole time!"

"Wow, that's great!" cheered Clown, spinning around on his unicycle in relief.

The small celebration was cut short though, when the clanking of chains caught their attentions, as they turned to look at the old well that had been dry for quite some years. There was always a cage sitting in it, but nobody paid it any mind, until now when it seemed to come out from the ground, holding someone else in it. Once it stopped moving, a very exhausted Vladimir staggered out from the cage, robes torn to shreds.

"Vladimir Vampire!" gasped Jack, walking briskly over to the vampire visitor's side to help him stand up. "You look undead tired, what happened to you?"

After inhaling and exhaling several times, Vladimir managed to say, "Children…kidnapped me…"

This was all he managed to say, since Jack immediately interrupted him, not knowing that the vampire had more to say about what happened. "So it was Lock, Shock, and Barrel! I'm terribly sorry Vladimir, those three are kind of known for their not so warm welcomes to newcomers. The next time I see them, you'll be sure that they get more than just a good talking to! C'mon, I'll help you back to the Vampire Brothers' place."

Jack led Vladimir towards the Residential Area, followed by Clown who was now off duty, and wanted to go back home himself. The Vampire might have felt the need to tell the Pumpkin King of his run in with Oogie Boogie, but he felt there was no need. After all, there wouldn't be much left of the Boogie Man by sunset the next day. Why bother Jack with small details when the Vladimir's curse would take care of his problem?

XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxX

OH THE NOES! D: Did Oogie get cursed? I think he did…uh oh, Vladimir better watch out for the raging Oogie fans who just finished this chapter, (like I do xD) Again guys, I'm sorry for such a late update! I promise this time I won't leave you with this cliffy for too long! Just what will happen to Oogie in the next chapter of The Nightmare After Christmas? Well, he can't die, that'd be a crappy way to end the fic! And it wouldn't be much of a story not would it? So far though the entire story has reached 88 pages! Wow…and it's not even close to being finished yet! There is soo much I have planned!

Anyways, I'd like to thank the following for their reviews:

SexySaiyanSakura (who is now known as Raptured Night)

Jack's Sweetie

Marissa

White Angel

Hearts Aglow

The Narrator

UnCanon

EvilRanma

Kaitlynn (who even emailed me )

Phantom's Bride

Sparky sinner

Thanks guys for continuing to read this story! I see some new reviewers too! And I'd like to also thank fresh new readers as well. Also a special thanks to The Narrator again, for pointing out the grammar error about the dialog and the comma thing. I have seen that before, but didn't understand it till you explained it. Thanks so much! I'm really glad to have a reviewer like you pointing these things out that my super duper helpers, and myself miss during proof reading. Hope you enjoyed the chapter, and send your reviews my way, cuz you know I love them

Laterz,

Sydney Daimao


	10. IX: Cure for Boogie's Bug

Disclaimer: I do NOT own The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly, and Vladimir, but that's it folks!

Author's Note: Sorry it's taken me awhile to update yet again, but life's been busy since I've become a Sr. in High School, and have been taking a class that gives you a job that pays you in school credits (cuz I needed them…) so by the end of the day I've been exausted. But on Friday in my Ceramics class we were watching The Nightmare Before Christmas, and since it's October, and I've been playing Oogie's Revenge some more, I've gotten into the mood to write! Thankies to my special helpers, Raptured Night, and Marissa! On with chapter nine!

* * *

Chapter Nine: Cure for Boogie's Bug

When the light of the pumpkin sun shone obnoxiously bright in Molly's face the next morning, she reluctantly forced herself out of bed and onto her feet. For some reason she didn't feel like facing the new day, especially if she had to grin, and bear another date with Vladimir. The only good part about those dates were that it kept her mother happy, and usually she could keep her from asking too many questions when she returned from them by saying that she'd rather not talk about it. To that, Jewel would seem like she understood, and then mentioned something about not kissing and telling being the best thing to keep the gossips away.

Not yet ready to start her day, Molly walked slowly to the door in her half awake daze, and was planning to pull the shade down on the window, until something caught her half open eyes' attention. The gate to the town was open! Suddenly the rag doll was much more awake, and didn't seem to want to crawl back into bed anymore. Actually, she rushed right to her new wardrobe, and with swift hands she began to search through the dresses that were made by Sally's hand, and paid for by her mother. She knew though that if she left the town wearing one of the elegant gowns that she would most certainly catch more attention as she traveled to Oogie's lair, than she would if she wore her regular leather dress. Besides, why would she have to impress Oogie? It wasn't like she wanted to, and he probably wouldn't care what she was wearing. He'd probably be angry with her for not showing up for so long without even a clue as to why she stopped visiting him.

Sighing as she began to change into her normal dress for the first time in what seemed like an eternity, Molly muttered to herself, "I'll just have to figure out some sort of peace offering later, after I explain the situation to him." Then a thought struck her mind, a thought about how she was suddenly so anxious to go see Oogie. At first when she returned, it was partially out of obligation to the promise she made him, and also because she wanted to challenge him to more games. Now though, it seemed without seeing him for so long, it had made her life go back to such a predictable, and simple one. Perhaps now she really was considering him more as a friend, and less of an angry bag of bugs that would come after her if she didn't return to his lair.

Once Molly finished lacing her boots, she practically flew from her room and out of the laboratory, heading towards the gate that opened her world up again to what really made her feel some level of excitement, before she would be trapped in the town again.

* * *

The Boogieman had forgotten how much fun it was to be evil, that after last night, he was even more driven to finding out just how he should get his revenge on the Pumpkin King, who still thought he was dead. Thing was, it was easier said than done, especially when the burlap terror was still on an evil scheme hiatus. He was glad when his henchmen came into Oogie's Billiard Parlor, and announced that he had a visitor. Each of the brats held a grin upon their face, so the burlap villain began to grin himself, thinking perhaps it was Vladimir returning for another round of Wheel of Torture. "Someone's here to see you boss!" they all said together. 

"Well, by all means, show them in," Oogie replied, and when the children disappeared, and the leather clad rag doll stood in the doorway, he realized that it wasn't the Vampire after all.

Acting as if they had been seeing each other for the past two weeks, Molly smiled at him softly speaking, "Hey Boogie, ready to finally lose at pool today?"

Even though Oogie had been anticipating the return of her daily visits to chase away his boredom, he couldn't help but narrow his eyes at how she didn't even acknowledge her long period of absence. "Oh? Are you sure you even **_remember_** what pool is Doll Face?" he asked her with a tone of resentment. He then added in a softer, bitterer tone, "You seem to have a poor **_memory_** after all."

"Yeah, of course I remember," Molly replied, obviously getting defensive at Oogie's rudeness. She knew she had no right to be, after all, he did have a right to be angry, but she couldn't help but be a little offended.

A scoff came from Oogie, before he began to cough, something he had been doing since he woke up this morning, but didn't feel concerned about. "Is that so?" he began to say in a raspy tone due to the coughing, but then cleared his throat a bit to speak more clearly in contempt. "I guess that vampire lover-boy of yours didn't distract you too much then. At least you can still **_remember_** what pool is, even though that's all you **_remembered_**!"

"Lover-boy?" Molly repeated, her nose wrinkled a bit in distaste of Oogie's wording. Then it occurred to her what he meant. Vladimir. She hardly considered using him and the word love in the same sentence. "Wait, who told you about Vladimir?"

Knowing that he wouldn't dare tell Molly about the torture session he had with the vampire the night before, Oogie straightened himself out before telling her cautiously, "I have my ways. I am…" he was cut off from finishing his sentence when the urge to cough again came, and had to pause in order to do so several times. Once he satisfied that impulse, he then continued to say, "…the Oogie Boogie man."

Molly rolled her eyes the way he felt compelled to repeat whom he was all the time, and in her growing frustration with him couldn't help but speak her mind, "I can remember just fine who you are, especially after you say your name about a dozen times a day!"

Oogie scowled as she folded her arms over her chest, as if she had a reason to be upset. She had no right to be sassing back to him! "I figured I should make sure, since it's been awhile. I thought maybe you perhaps, oh I don't know, FORGOT me!"

"I'm here, aren't I? That means I DIDN'T!" the rag doll snapped back in irritation.

"What's wrong Doll Face?" Oogie asked in mock concern, "Trouble in paradise make you remember?" In her response, he hoped to find out in an indirect way if Vladimir had heeded his warning, and left Molly alone.

As the Boogieman began to have another coughing fit, Molly turned her back to him, too angry with him to pay attention to how much he was coughing. She could feel how her stitched lips were beginning to frown, and for some reason, she felt more upset that he was accusing her of not remembering him when she really thought of him every day. However, the doll didn't want to admit such a thing to Oogie. It would only make him more arrogant, or he'd scoff at her, and say she was lying. "I don't even see why I came back here to see you," she replied, frowning a bit more as she spoke.

Oogie glared at her back as she made it seem like it was his entire fault, and when he could finally stop coughing to speak again, he retorted, "I bet I do! Fang-boy wasn't around!"

Turning around to face him, making her raven hair whip around, she questioned, "What do you care about him anyways?"

"I don't," he managed to say between his coughing fit that was getting worse, and longer, with some of his bugs from inside his mouth falling out that he didn't notice right away. "I don't like it when people break deals with me!"

Molly's hair swept forward as she returned her gaze forward, her back still to him. She also hadn't noticed how Oogie had started to cough up bugs. "Well since you seem to know everything about my life, and how busy it's gotten, maybe you'll understand why I won't be coming back!"

At this statement, Oogie narrowed his eyes, hoping his hollow sockets could burn into her back. "Maybe I won't have to care, once I feed you to Betsy like I planned to do in the first place!" he declared, glad that he didn't have to cough to interrupt his threat.

"And maybe I should just go tell Jack everything about you still being alive, and how you tried to feed me to your spider!" Molly threatened back in spite, even though she knew she would never do it.

"I'd like to see you-" Oogie began to say, until he began to cough again, more bugs falling from his mouth onto the floor. He didn't take interest in this though, since he was too preoccupied in his argument with Molly.

Molly also continued not to notice either, since she continued to keep her back to him, upset with him that her greatly anticipated reunion took such a turn for the worst. "You just watch me leave! Good bye!"

As he saw Molly begin to walk away from him with the last word, Oogie couldn't stand it, and managed to croak out, "Wait, I'm not-" but that was all he could say before his horrible cough came back.

"Not what?" she asked harshly, stopping, but still refusing to look at him.

"Fin-shed," he managed to say, but it was barely understandable with how much he was coughing. Oogie narrowed his eyes even more in annoyance since he couldn't say all he wanted to.

"Then hurry up and finish," Molly snapped, trying to hide her hurt feelings with an impatient tone, "the morning is still young, and I could be doing something worthwhile."

Not able to answer because of his now hoarse coughing, Oogie's ire grew more; especially when Molly began to tap one of her small boot clad feet, almost to the point where he wanted to break her foot. When his coughing ceased for the moment, he thought of a better approach. In the time he had spent with Molly, he noticed that she was more prone to showing him sympathy when he made himself seem in need. One could guess it was just in her feminine nature. Whatever the case may be, it could just maybe get Oogie back into her favor, and keep her around without having to ask her to right out, and keep his pride in tact.

"Forgive me for being under the weather," he began, pretending to be hurt in a convincing way, or convincingly enough to make the rag doll turn her attention back to him with a curious glance. Grinning only mentally at how perfect a reaction he got out of her, to not give away his act, he continued to say as gloomily as he could, "But you wouldn't know about that, would you? Maybe you should just leave. I don't feel like putting up with your insensitiveness today."

With her anger melting away, Molly began to walk back to him, her emerald eyes showing a good amount of concern now, as she realized that he really didn't sound healthy. "How long have you been coughing like that?"

Backing away from her, to continue making his act seem genuine, Oogie responded in a dejected way, "Why should you care? It's not like you have been around to know that for yourself!" Now it was his turn to turn his back on her, and began to make it seem as if he was planning to walk into another room of his lair, but really he just wanted to have her stop him, with more concern for him in her attitude.

Oogie almost couldn't help making a grin when he heard her boots tapping sharply against the floor as she followed him. "It's not like I enjoyed those outings with Vladimir," she told him, not wanting to refer to them as dates. "I would have found a way to get out of them if the main gate wasn't locked off for the past two weeks." This caused Oogie to stop moving forward, and she heard him begin to mumble, though she couldn't understand what he was saying. "Didn't Lock, Shock, and Barrel tell you about that?" she asked curiously. When she heard him mutter about feeding those three to Betsy, she had a good feeling that they hadn't, and asked him again, "How long have you been sick?"

Giving a shrug, and trying to make the topic sound casual, since he couldn't very well admit that he got sick after torturing her supposed boyfriend, Oogie replied, "Oh, about a day."

"Didn't think a bag of bugs could get sick," she commented, before looking down and noticing that he had coughed up a large amount of bugs that were scattered around where they were once arguing. "You realize that you're losing your bugs, don't you?"

"No, I'm just on a new diet," he answered sarcastically, even though he also just realized this as well, and didn't want to show much concern over it.

Annoyed by how lightly he was taking his health, Molly gave him a slight glare, "This is serious! You could be really sick! Especially if you keep coughing up what you're made of."

This time Oogie could allow himself to smirk, and managed to keep it even as he coughed once. "Why, Doll Face, I'm touched."

"What caused you to get sick anyways?" she asked, her tone a little less strict, and more concerned for his well-being again.

Oogie was silent for a moment, before he shrugged again, having a feeling that what insignificant thing Vladimir said before he parted wasn't really so unimportant, he answered, "A curse I suppose."

Upon hearing the word curse, Molly's usually partially lowered eyelids receded back to show a look of surprise. "A curse! Which one? Tell me you remember it!" she cried out urgently, as if it were a matter of life or death.

Thoughtful about this, since he really didn't pay much attention to what Vladimir said the night before his skeletal minions tossed him into the Magma Maze, Oogie replied unsurely, pretty much guessing, "Regurg-itis thing?" Scratching his head, to see if it would help his memory, he continued to guess what the curse was. "Or was it regurg-otis?"

Molly began to ponder over some of the curses she heard about from the Witches, and when she heard some of the ideas Oogie was coming up with, she had a good feeling that she knew the name of the one he meant. "You don't mean Regurgitious Organious, do you?" she questioned in a soft, reluctant tone.

"Yeah, that's the one!" Oogie confirmed, "Knew there was a regurg in there somewhere." Although he was relieved to have figured out the name of the curse, it seemed to only further Molly's worry, which in turn, made him worried. Not wanting to show that he was troubled by her upset look, and by her frantically looking around for something, he stated, "I'm sure it's not that big of a deal," then asked hesitantly, "is it?"

Finally, Molly spoke, but didn't really answer Oogie's question, "We have to find a bucket!" she told him, almost in a panic, but she tried to stay calm. She wasn't sure how much time Oogie had to live, and what she needed to go was rush back to town and see if the witches would know, and have the ingredients for the cure to his curse. However, Oogie would need to put the bugs he coughed up into himself again, so they would need to collect all his bugs. Molly knew she didn't have time to do both. Lucky for her, Oogie's boys were peeking from either side of the doorframe, watching as the Boogieman and she quarreled. "You guys, find a bucket, and get all of Oogie's bugs into it, and find another for him to keep the other bugs he coughs up from now on into the second container. I have to go to the Witches' Shop as fast as I can!"

Oogie blinked, as his henchmen scurried around to do as Molly said, and watched Molly walk at a fast pace out of the room. Oogie followed, and asked her again by the door, "Is it?"

"I'll be back!" she replied, as she now began to run towards the hidden exit to his lair that she used whenever she came to see him.

Now alone, Oogie stood where he was, not sure how worried about this curse he should really be. "Is it?" he asked himself, then replied, "Nah, it's not. I'm going to be fine." Despite what he said to himself, Oogie held a worried expression.

* * *

It was in the afternoon when Molly finally returned to Oogie's lair, out of breath, with her leather dress having new rips at the bottom, and caked with dirt around where her knees were located under the dress. She was in luck when the witches knew what the recipe for the remedy of the Regurgitious Organious curse, but the problem was they didn't have all the ingredients for it in stock. So Molly ended up having to dig for slugs to collect their slime, and then collect various herbs that she didn't bother remembering the names of. After collecting the ingredients that were missing, the witches then gave her a slip of paper that had the directions on how to brew the remedy, and then Molly ran straight back to Lock, Shock, and Barrel's tree house, where Oogie's lair was hidden below the ground.

Now that she was inside of Oogie's lair again, she placed down the basket, and rested against the turning knob of the giant Roulette table in the torture chamber. Once she got a few seconds' rest, she brushed some of her hair from her face and called out as loud as she could manage, "Oogie, where are you?" She hoped that he was still alive, that the curse hadn't taken full effect, but she also couldn't hear him coughing when she came in, and was worried that it might have been too late.

When her call was replied with by several coughs, and Oogie's now raspy voice responding from the same room she had left him in, "In here Doll Face."

Her boots clip-clopped loudly on the stone floor after she retrieved her basket again, and hurried towards the sound of Oogie's voice, and didn't let herself give a sigh of relief before she saw him sitting down, holding onto a bucket the trick-or-treaters found for him, filled three fourths of the way with his bugs. Between her breaths, she said more to herself than to him, "Oh, good…" Taking about a minute to catch her breath again, she then headed towards the Boogieman's kitchen, now feeling pressed for time again to make the potion, and have Oogie take it. "The brewing of the remedy shouldn't take too long, I just have to heat everything up."

"By all means take your time," Oogie said to her retreating back in a dry tone, upset over the whole ordeal of being cursed, and because he thought she took too long to come back from town.

Once she was in the kitchen, she placed down her basket, and looked back, noticing that Oogie didn't follow her, like she assumed he would. "Come into the kitchen," she beckoned, "You'll need to drink the concoction right away," then she added, "and I'm not going to walk back to you and serve it to you. I'm not your maid after all." She heard him mutter from the other room, but he complied with her instruction, and took a seat at the table, which was set up to seat four, but could seat five if the occasion came up. "Where's a medium sized pot Boogie?" she asked him, a little impatiently.

"On top of the cabinets," he replied, annoyed that she was getting snippy with him when she should have been much nicer to him in his state of ill health.

Molly looked up to find exactly what she was looking for, but the problem was that she couldn't reach it, at least not without some help. "I can't reach that," she responded dryly, looking back at him with her eyelids half closed, expecting him to help.

"Then I suggest you find a way so you can," the ungentlemanly burlap sack replied uncaringly. "I'm sick, remember?" Oogie even conveniently coughed a few times to prove his point, even though he was probably capable to reaching for the pot.

Sighing, and wondering why she even bothered thinking that he would help her, Molly took hold of the back of one of the wooden chairs placed at the table, and dragged it towards the cabinets. Oogie didn't have any step stools, which would have been more suitable for such assistance, but he didn't complain when she used it to stand taller. Now she was able to reach the pot, but just barely. Plus, there were several other tin pots of various sizes placed very disorganized on top of the one she wanted. Rising up on her toes, she then reached one arm out so her fingers could grip the lip around the pot she wanted, while using her other arm to keep her balance. Moving it away as gingerly as she could, she noticed that no matter what, pots would come tumbling down on her. Not having the time to waste trying to avoid the inevitable, she pulled the pot with enough force to free it, but in turn caused the other pots on top of it to fall down around her, two of them even hit her temple and her shoulder, making her flinch and groan in response to the pain she felt.

Her lips formed into a frown when she heard Oogie chuckling behind her at her misfortune, and she even growled after he said, "You know you're going to have to pick those up and put them back later, right?" In Oogie's opinion, it was what she deserved, even though he knew now it wasn't entirely her fault that she had been missing in action for fourteen days. Aside from that, it was rather comical to see all the pots fall on her, in a sadistic sense.

"I don't have to make this potion for you," she stated, threatening him with narrowed eyes. Oogie grinned at her, but had to stop when he needed to cough again, and Molly stepped down from the chair. Moving the chair back to the table, and kicking the other pots that feel with her boot, she then headed towards the stove, placing the pot she had in her hand on top of it, and started one of the burners.

Oogie Boogie watched her as she prepared the remedy for him, silently enjoying that she was going to take care of him, but had no intention of thanking her. After all, she belonged to him; it was her duty to take care of him if he needed it. He shouldn't have to thank her for doing something she should have to do in the first place. Also, it was in a way her fault he got cursed, because if she hadn't been wasting her time with Vladimir, and been trying to loyally figure out a way to sneak out of town, even with the obstacle of a locked main gate, he wouldn't have had to torture Vladimir, and get cursed by him in retaliation. Although if he could be cured, it would have been worth it, since now he had Molly back, and Vladimir's attempt at revenge would have been in vain. It wasn't until the raven-haired rag doll handed him a chipped metallic cup to him that he snapped out of his thoughts, and realized she was finished brewing the remedy for him. He couldn't help raising his brows at the green yellow liquid that had had orange colored steam rising from it. "What is it?" he asked suspiciously.

A sigh of frustration came from Molly before she asked bluntly, "Do you want to be cured or not, Oogie?"

The cursed sack man glared at her for being snappy again, but only muttered incoherently before taking the cup from her hand and began to drink from it. He noticed Molly looking intently at him, the same way gourmet chiefs would as an important person was sampling one of their finest dishes. Sensing that she would want to know how he thought it tasted, he told her, "Hey, not bad." At this response, she smiled, a smile he missed seeing on her since he made her produce that expression with a few simple words. Oogie liked how he could be the cause of her mood, it was an empowering feeling of control he could have over her, despite how much she would state that he didn't have any.

"Good, because you'll have to finish drinking three cups of it in order for the curse to wear off," she told him before taking his now finished cup from him, and began to fill a second one.

"What's in it?" he asked before taking a drink of his second cup of remedy.

After he successfully finished the second cup, and handed it to her for his third, and final one, Molly responded as she filled it up for the last time, "It's a mixture of slug slime, several herbs, and fresh snot." Now she anxiously waited for his response, since snot, even in Halloween Town, was a bit of an acquired taste.

Oogie didn't seem to mind the snot though, "Pretty good, doesn't beat **_my_** Snake and Spider stew though, but still, not bad."

"That's good," Molly sighed as she pulled a chair back and sat across from Oogie. She had been a little sleepy when she had woken up, but hadn't gone back to bed when she knew she could see Oogie Boogie. Now she felt exhausted from worry, and from running around Halloween Town. She planted her arms on the table and rested her chin on her folded hands.

Curious, Oogie asked, "So, what brought you back here anyways, Doll Face?" He had no idea how she felt about Vladimir, if she cared about him or not.

"The same thing that always does," she responded softly, since she began to feel drowsier in this position.

"My charm?" Oogie guessed with a chuckle, knowing now that she had come back to see him, wanting to spend time with him.

"Being stuck in Halloween Town with nothing fun to do," Molly responded, giving a yawn.

"Boring huh?" Oogie was now amused, as she continued to confirm that she did enjoy spending time with him, and that he wouldn't have to force her to return to his lair each day.

Molly nodded a few times, "Uh huh. Those outings with Vladimir we so boring; he's even more conceded than you."

"Hey!" the boogieman pretended to be offended, but his grin gave it away, "Nobody's more conceded than me! Then again, nobody has as much reason to be. After all, I was once king of my own holiday." Starting to tell Molly again about his now forgotten holiday, which he had ruled with a tone of great pride, he placed down his cup for the moment. "Yep, Bug Day, perhaps one of the best holidays of all time, or it could have been, if those lousy humans hadn't forgotten about it!" He waited for Molly to agree with him, but when she was silent for several moments, he glanced at her with a glare, "Hey, I was talking." He stopped scolding her when he noticed that she had fallen asleep at the table. Her large doe eyes closed in peaceful slumber, and black lips curved into a small smile, partially open as she breathed softly. Oogie watched her curiously for a bit before finishing his last cup, thinking, 'I wonder if she'll notice if I move her. I've missed using her as my pillow, and sleeping off the rest of this curse would be a nice way to end the day.'

Once he finished drinking the last of his remedy, he then chugged the bucket of bugs into his mouth, knowing now that they would stay inside of him, and then got up to creep over to Molly. She continued to sleep, even when he picked her up carefully to keep her from waking up. Her body moved exactly the way a soft doll would, practically lifeless, and felt like deadweight once he had her in his arms. Grinning in triumph, he then continued to creep towards another room of his lair, the room he used when he wanted to sleep better. It wasn't extravagantly decorated like his other rooms, since he rarely used it, so he barely considered it a bedroom, especially since it lacked even a bed. But the lack of neon decorations kept him from being distracted enough to sleep when he needed to. Oogie placed Molly down on the floor so she would lay on her stomach when he reached this bland room, and then laid down, his head overlapping her lower back, using her as a pillow like he had several times before.

When she felt the familiar pressure of Oogie's head on her back, Molly's eyes fluttered open for a brief moment, but she was too tired to bother saying anything in protest, and let herself fall asleep again.

* * *

The sun was setting when Vladimir felt up to stepping out of the Vampire brother's manor, and headed out to see Molly for the last time. 'Oh well, it's not a total loss,' he thought to himself. When he once again found himself being greeted by Jewel, and asked to see Molly, Jewel informed him that she was not at home.

"She left this morning," she told him, "haven't seen her since. Perhaps she's at work, or on her way to see you."

"Yes, perhaps," Vladimir replied, and left to the Witches' Shop, only to find out that Molly was not there either.

"She was here this afternoon though," the Short Witch informed him, "wanting the ingredients for a curse's remedy."

Vladimir raised a brow, "A remedy for a curse?"

"Indeed," confirmed the Tall Witch, "We figured that she wanted it to help you, since we heard you were not feeling quite well last night."

Vladimir left the Witches' Shop after asking for which ingredients, and once the door to the shop closed behind him, he began to walk forward towards the town square with a thoughtful look. He knew now exactly what Molly had been up to that day. 'She went to cure that Oogie Boogie, and most likely saved him from the fate I had hoped him to have,' he thought with narrowed brows. But why? He was perhaps the most obnoxious creature he had ever met; yet she would go to his aid? Whatever relationship the two had, could most likely be easily severed. After all, Molly had quite the demanding mother, whom from what he noticed in his time amongst the Finkelstein women, held the power over Molly's actions. He could not help but smirk, as he began to think out what exactly he was going to tell Jewel, without mentioning Oogie Boogie. After all, the last thing he needed was a repeat of what happened to him last night.

* * *

Uh oh, that Vladimir is up to no good again! What exactly is he going to tell Jewel? And the story is only two pages shy of reaching One hundred! Oh well, the next one shall reach that milestone. And in the next chapter, the plot will thicken more after Oogie tells Molly the reason why he was killed last Christmas. Will it be the truth? Or his own twisted version of it? Stick around for the next chapter of The Nightmare After Christmas, and find out! 

I'd like to thank the following for their reviews:

Raptured Night

Phantom's Bride

Jack's Sweetie

Beany

Moonliterider

Alena Jamie Aberdeen

Kaitlynn

Queen Freaky

Kiely

Phyllis Joy Wolfe

SomeKindofIdiot

Hearts Aglow

Thank you for continuing to follow the story, and thank you new readers for choosing to take some time to read this fic. Please, I encourage all who read to review, because I like to hear what others have to say about it. I hope to update again as soon as I can, because I'm getting to a part of the story where it gets exciting or it leads up to the excitement.

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	11. X: Deception

Disclaimer: I do not own The Nightmare Before Chirstmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's about it.

Author's Note: Squee, I'm happy to say that now the story has reached over 100 pages! And I know that pretty soon there are going to be 100 reviews for this fanfic, and I just want to say thank you all for reading, reviewing, and being so patient with this last update. Work and school really took all my energy for the most part and now that I don't have to work anymore for credits, I can hopefully write more in my spare time instead of sitting around feeling tired. Special thanks goes out to Marissa, to whom I dedicate the fic to, and of course to Raptured Night, who not only helps me proofread like Marissa, but is also the reason why Oogie is so wonderfully in character. Anyways, without further a do, this is chapter ten! Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter Ten: Deception

"What do you mean that Molly's disappeared?" Jewel questioned, though her outraged tone made it seem more like a demand.

Vladimir, who stood inside the Doctor's laboratory along side the two Witches, put on his most empathetic expression as he could possibly make, especially since he really wanted to smirk at his own ingenious plot to get back at Oogie Boogie. "What else could have happened to her then?"

"She didn't show up for her work shift," the Short witch informed Jewel, to validate Vladimir's story.

"She did come in once though, to get some ingredients for a potion, but we thought it was for Vladimir, since he was feeling under the weather," the Tall Witch added.

The vampire then said, "But I haven't seen her since last night."

This was enough to spark the over imaginative, and pessimistic Jewel's mind, and she immediately took charge. "Well then did you question everyone in the town of her whereabouts?"

"We were about to but we thought we'd see if she was at home," Vladimir replied, "I can't bear the thought of Molly being in possible danger."

Jewel seemed even more worried now, "Then what are we waiting for?"

While this was going on, Molly was just beginning to awaken from her nap, feeling a little more disoriented, instead of refreshed. Most likely it was because she had been sleeping on the ground while taking the role of Oogie's pillow. "How long have I been sleeping?" she asked herself, trying to look around for any sign of a window in this room she had yet to visit in Oogie's lair. Because of this feature, or lack of feature, the room was almost pitch black, if it wasn't for the exit of the room, which didn't have a door to seal off the neon lights from other parts of Oogie's domain. The Oogie's burlap body also gave off some light, but not enough to light the whole room, but it helped her to find him so she could tug on the top of his head to rouse him from sleep as well. The Boogieman grumbled an incoherent threat, and stubbornly refused to wake up. "Boogie, wake up," she told him in a soft voice, but with a no-nonsense tone. "I have to get up, and you're too heavy for me to push off."

More grumbling came from an irritable burlap sack man before he reluctantly opened his eyes, and replied in a similar groggy tone, "Then why don't you try to be a good pillow and stay quiet, hmm Doll Face?"

A sigh of irritation escaped her mouth before Molly responded, "Because I have a home to go to before it gets too late, that's why."

Oogie turned over on his side so he wouldn't have to face Molly's scowl and yawned, "So? I am already at home, doesn't bother me none if you can't figure out how to sneak back into your own place."

Determined to have her way in this situation, Molly began to press her palms into Oogie's shoulders in a vain attempt to push him off of her body to free herself, and figure out what time of day it was. "C'mon Oogie, I'm serious!" she told him with a grunt from the strain she was experiencing, feeling like she was trying to move a wall of stone.

Because of Molly's determination to keep him from falling asleep again, Oogie Boogie regretfully sat up, so the rag doll was free to move about again. "Fine, and once you're done checking the time, make me something to eat why don'cha?"

"Make something yourself," she replied from the hallway after she left the room in search of a window that would give her a glimpse of the outside world. "It's probably time for me to head home anyways. I do have a **life** outside of this place."

Frowning at her last statement, Oogie then stood up and began to follow Molly, bent on reminding her just who was the boss around here. "If it weren't for my generosity you wouldn't, and don't you forget it either, 'cause I can always make you remember!"

Molly turned around when she felt his looming presence over her once he caught up to her. Folding her arms over her chest, she smirked, knowing that he was demanding her appreciation for his so-called, "generous" action. "Is that so? Well, if it wasn't for my generosity, you'd be a pile of bugs all over your lair by now." She grinned triumphantly as Oogie glared at her for bringing up how she cured the curse on him, daring him to try and come up with something that would top that. While he was fuming over the blow to his ego in silence, Molly decided not to waste another moment, and find a room with a window, and began to walk down the long hallway to find his torture room, knowing for sure that it had the feature she desired to find.

Not wanting her to win by having the last word, Oogie responded in a tone of steadily growing ire, "Well if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have had that problem either Doll Face!" Before he began on a rant of how her precious Fang-boy cursed him, he caught himself, and realized that the statement would probably make Molly question his meaning. To try and cover up his folly, he added bitterly, "You did take your sweet time to come visit me again. Just how long did it take you? Hmm?" Now speaking in a sarcastic way, he told her, "I'm glad you could steal some time away from Vladdy, otherwise I would have ended up as a pile of bugs." Pausing a moment, he then added thoughtfully, "Not that it would have been the first time that's happened."

Luckily for Oogie's sake, Molly had tuned out everything he was saying, and gasped when she noticed how dark it was outside, especially since it seemed that the clouds were covering the crescent moon. "Oh no, it's already dark! Mom's going to kill me!" Suddenly she began to walk briskly towards the secret exit of the casino themed lair, and quickly added a word of parting over her shoulder, "I have to go now."

Unhappy with the thought of Molly in such a rush to leave, and noticing that she didn't promise to return the next day like she usually did, he pretended not to care, but it was obvious that he was upset. "I would say see you tomorrow, but I'm not so sure if that'll actually happen. Not with Fang Boy around anyways. I can remember the last time how you said you would see me later, and how much time it took for later to come."

Glaring back at him, not believing that Oogie would chose now to act so selfishly, Molly retorted, "I don't have time to argue with you over this! I'm going home!"

Wanting to pursue the matter further since he was motivated by how touchy she seemed to be at the moment, Oogie continued to badger her. "I guess you wouldn't have time! Seeing as how you're probably late for a late night rendezvous with your precious little vampire anyways!"

"I am not!" Molly protested, stopping her fast pace for a moment to clarify that she had no intention of seeing Vladimir. She already had enough of his accusations, most especially the ones involving the self-centered suitor, which was appointed to her by her mother.

"Going to skip the date tonight then?" he asked snidely as he took his turn to cross his arms over his chest, daring her to prove him wrong.

"There is no date!" Molly exclaimed, now yelling in frustration. "I don't even know why I'm letting your opinion bother me. I have somewhere to go, and it's none of your business if I did have a date or not!"

After she turned away from him again, the boogieman decided to switch tactics in a final act to coax her into staying with him a little while longer. Acting as if he was resentful, he spoke in a dejected way, "Fine, I don't need you anyway. I can find something to do. It's not like I'm trapped down here for the rest of my days in almost complete solitude."

Too irritated with Oogie to care about his feelings anymore, especially when he didn't even seem to care about her own situation, Molly changed her tone and expression to one of apathy, as she responded, "That's right. You're not too fat to the exit to your lair. And if you are, then I'm sure you're smart enough to construct one that can accommodate to your size."

Oogie didn't have to pretend to be upset with her now that she intentionally insulted him with a word he hated to be called by. "No, I'm not! I'm just too interested in avoiding being killed by your King of Halloween, Jack Skellington!"

"Well that's not my problem," she responded snidely.

The burlap sack man was a little surprised by how cold her tone was at the moment, since she normally wouldn't talk that way to him. It annoyed Oogie, and he let his shoulders sag in defeat. "No, I guess it wouldn't be." Resisting the urge to keep her in his lair by force –which was a method he wished he could use more often, if Molly didn't put up a fight with him each time he did - Oogie turned his back on her, and began to walk towards another room slowly waddling, as if he was depressed now.

On the contrary, he was much more angry at the fact that he didn't have as much control over Molly as he would have liked. At first it was a little refreshing to not have her cower at the very sight of him like many other members of Halloween Town would have, her ignorance of how dangerous he really was being the cause of that fearlessness of his wrath. However, now that they had grown more comfortable in each other's lives, that insolence was beginning to irritate him, and he wished he could make her see things his way without having to argue, or act like he was some lonely hermit; even though he was, and would rather die by Jack's hands again in front of every member of Halloween Town than admit it to Molly. If only there was a way to do so. Molly was way too friendly with him to respond to his threats seriously enough anymore, and he didn't want to hurt her either, which could have an opposite effect, and drive her away. Even if he did try to use force, he was sure Molly knew how to manipulate him using her feminine wiles to eventually get her way. His insect filled head was empty with ideas on what else he could to do assert his authority over the rag doll that he considered his, just like his underground lair. He shouldn't have to be obligated to do without having her near when he wanted her to be. Shouldn't have to do practically everything but beg Molly to be by his side. Shouldn't have to wonder when her next visit was. Shouldn't have to fight for her attention.

Oogie was glad that his back was to Molly, so she wouldn't see the growing frown on his face as his mind lingered on these bitter thoughts, so his expression wouldn't ruin the act of hurt he was going for. "You're a terrible actor Oogie," he heard her say to him, still not allowing emotion to color her voice. It took whatever little self-control Oogie possessed not to turn around and take hold of her wrist and tell her he didn't have to be a good actor to make her stay. Instead he chose not to say anything, and continue waddling away from her. It seemed that this decision paid off, when he heard her sigh in defeat, and say in a reluctant, yet submissive enough tone, "Fine, it's too late now anyways, my mother will lecture me all the same, so I'd might as well stay a little longer, but only for a day. Tomorrow afternoon I'll have to go back, or else she'll send out another crazy search party, and that'll risk them finding out about you."

A chuckle escaped Oogie, as he thought victoriously, 'Yes! Ha ha ha! Looks like I've won this little game!' Turning around to face her again, he could not suppress the wide grin growing on his face. "So how about you cookin' something good for me then Doll Face? Might as well, since you plan on stickin' around. I feel like having roach potpie. Feel free to make something for yourself afterwards."

Molly replied to him with body language; placing her small hands on her hips, and shifting her weight to one leg, making her right hip jut out to the side, as well as twisting her mouth so her lips pursed together to the side, and lowered her eyelids to half closed slits. Oogie Boogie let himself chuckle, liking this particular pose Molly would make when he talked to her like he was right now. He knew even though she gave him a defiant look, and used her body to silently tell him that she wouldn't do as he said, that she would eventually give in, and do as he wished. This behavior was actually quite cute, since it was predictable out of her, almost as much as his own behavior would be if she lifted the skirt to her dress to allow him a peek of her wonderful legs.

"Why can't you cook?" she questioned him, keeping the look on her face, and began to tap her foot.

"Because you can," he replied simply, knowing that it would irritate her.

Molly was quick to argue, "But you can too."

Shrugging his burlap shoulders, Oogie responded carelessly, "But I don't plan to. So if we're going to eat tonight, it's because you cooked."

With that said, the Boogie Man began to hum his part of "This is Halloween" as he strolled towards his kitchen, expecting Molly to follow him.

Molly shook her head, muttering to herself, "Why do I put up with him?" before she proceeded into the same room as Oogie. "Well if I'm going to stay here longer," she began after they both arrived in the room made for food preparation, "then you're going to have to give me a reason to **want** to." The rag doll passed up Oogie, brushing against him intentionally, but acting like she accidentally bumped into him. Sitting upon the wooden table, she faced him with a grin that she wore whenever she had something in mind.

After feeling her bump into him, Oogie couldn't help but scowl in annoyance for a few moments. However, after noticing the difference in her attitude, her bump didn't seem as annoying as it first seemed. Brushing himself off where she made contact with him, he grumbled, "Mind watchin' where you're goin' Doll Face? I know even I don't take up that much space here."

Leaning back on the heels of her hand, Molly then crossed her right leg over her left thigh casually. With her grin still plastered on her face, she responded, "Right."

Hungry, and as impatient as ever, Oogie wasn't in the mood for whatever reason Molly had for delaying the creation of his next meal. Tapping his foot on the cold floor several times to warn her, and watching her still sit on his table with that irritating grin, he finally gave up and voiced his complaint. "Aren't you forgetting something?"

"I could just as easily make food at home," Molly began, pretending to find interest in the hem of her dress so that Oogie could catch a glimpse of some of her legs from below the knee. "So I'd like to know why cooking here is so special."

Of course Oogie's eyes were attracted to the exposed stitched flesh like a magnet. "It's special because you're cookin' in Oogie's lair," he explained, as if that alone would be a good reason.

"Well, since I'm doing you a favor," Molly spoke, changing the tone to a soothing coo. Laying down on her stomach now, but still having her dress hem pulled up enough to continue flashing some leg, she continued, "I figure maybe the Boogie Man might be so gracious as to grant me something in return."

Instead of being suspicious about her actions, Oogie was pleased by the tone of voice, and the respect she used in her response. "And just what might that be?" he asked, grinning in amused curiosity.

Without explanation, Molly suddenly sat up, and pushed herself off of the table. "That request was for roach pot pie, right?" she asked casually, as if the conversation they had never happened.

Oogie was caught off guard by this sudden change in her mood, and replied with uncertainty, "Uh, yes, that's right." As he watched Molly put together the ingredients for the meal, he began to wonder, 'Now just what was all that about?'

He wouldn't find out what it was about, until Molly popped the raw roach pie into the oven to cook, and came to sit in front of him. "So anyways, while we wait for the pie to cook," she began, again using the same tone as she did before while sitting on the table. "Maybe we should talk about that little favor you'd like to do for me, hmm?"

Oogie grinned back at her as he leaned forward in his seat, "Well, we can talk, but I can't make any promises, Doll Face."

A soft chuckle escaped Molly as she idly allowed her fingers to move across the table, making her index and middle fingers walk like legs. "Well my request is rather simple, Boogie." She then flashed him a coy smile as she adverted her eyes from her hand back to look him in the eye again.

"I doubt anythin' you come up with in that pretty little head of yours will be simple," Oogie replied dryly, now beginning to become wry of her intentions.

Molly told him casually, "I just want an answer to a question of mine is all."

Deciding to just give into Molly in this case, Oogie sighed as he responded, "Fine, ask away."

No longer teasing Oogie, the rag doll put on a straight face, and asked in a straightforward manner. "I was wondering why Jack Skellington killed you last year?" When she noticed how Oogie's disposition changed, she felt the need to explain her reason for asking. "It's just that Jack seems like such a patient person, and since nobody really seemed to want to remember you, I wanted to know what happened back then, since I wasn't around."

The Boogieman had not expected that kind of question from the rag doll from how she was behaving. "What!" he exclaimed on impulse, not using a furious tone as one might expect him to use. Instead, it was out of shock, almost in a sort of panic. His mind raced for an answer as he thought, 'She just had to ask that! Why in all hollow's eve did she have to ask me that?' Stealing a quick peek at Molly to see if she was catching on to his hesitation to answer the question, he was again taken my surprise to see her waiting patiently for his response. For a moment he watched her as she blinked her large eyes that stared back at him with an earnest want for an explanation. That look made Oogie have to swallow a lump in his throat. 'If I told her the truth,' he continued to think to himself, 'she would never want to come see me again.' Then it hit him, and he felt silly for feeling worried, 'No worries, I just won't tell her the truth. Oh Oogie, you're a genius!'

Whatever self-control Oogie Boogie knew, he needed to use to keep himself from grinning widely as his mind created a most delicious lie to tell the raven-haired doll. Instead, he sighs, lowering his eyes in a sad expression, and sagging his shoulders. "It's a long story Doll," he replied in a most nostalgic way.

"If you don't feel like talking about it, that's alright," Molly replied, trying not to sound too interested. For some reason, she felt uncomfortable seeing Oogie with that look. She knew that he hated Jack, but she never really knew why, and maybe it wasn't her place to know either.

"No, no," Oogie waved his pointed arm as if to chase away whatever memories he had that made him seem so depressed all of a sudden. However his hopeless tone still lingered as he continued, "It's okay, I suppose I should tell someone." For a more heartbreaking display, he sighed again, and made it seem like he was admitting his deepest, darkest secret to her. "It was because of Sally."

Molly blinked again, now it was her turn to be taken off guard. "Sally?" she repeated in a puzzled tone. She couldn't have reacted more perfectly to the start of Oogie's lie, even if Oogie had her rehearse for it.

Forcing himself to speak in a softer tone, which was no easy task for him, since it was very much against his nature, the Boogieman nodded. "Back when your wonderful Pumpkin King and I had something in common; a certain rag doll. Of course, **Jack** wasn't gonna go for that." There was nothing fake about the venomous resentment Oogie used while speaking the King of Halloween's name. "So Bone Daddy decided to do something about it, and take care of another problem of his at the same time."

"He killed you because you both cared about Sally?" Molly asked when it seemed like he was ready to stop speaking for a moment. It just didn't seem logical. Even if she didn't believe Jack was the most perfect being in Halloween Town – despite popular opinion of the townspeople – she still couldn't believe that he would destroy Oogie for such a petty reason.

Nodding again to confirm what she asked, he even managed to look sad about it as he continued his sad, fake tale of injustice and unrequited love. "Not to mention he made a mess of things last year." Moving his pointed hands, he sounded exasperated, "He almost ruined Christmas! See, he wasn't happy bein' the king of his own holiday, so he had to go out and steal Christmas. Of course, that was after he kidnapped poor ol' Sandy Claws." That statement would probably be the only one in his story that had some fact behind it. "But when he failed at runnin' Christmas, in order to save face, he went and blamed me for kidnappin' Sandy, and Sally! He told the townspeople that he saved them both from a cruel fate, and had to do away with me. So you see how he took care of his problems, and managed to come out lookin' like the hero?" Shaking his head in disbelief over these faux memories, and added, "He even convinced Sally that I kidnapped her, when really I invited her to see me."

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked," was all Molly could think of saying. The unfair treatment of Oogie in the past was horrible, and not the good kind of horrible. Guilt rose up in her throat, making it seem difficult for her to say words of comfort. She gazed down at her hands, trying to avoid looking at him directly anymore. Not use to seeing the usually grouchy sack of bugs sad also made her quite uncomfortable in his presence now. Molly never experienced the loss of someone she cared about, nor had she experienced a true injustice. There were no words she could think of saying, even if guilt wasn't choking her at the moment.

This time Oogie allowed himself to smile, but he made sure to make it seem like one that was forced through sadness, "It's alright Doll, at least now someone knows the truth 'bout what really happened."

"I should check on the pie," she quickly made her excuse in order to avoid feeling obligated to sympathize with him. Pity for the Boogieman wasn't something she expected to feel, and she didn't know how to express it. There was nothing she could do, nothing she could say, that would be able to take back what had already been done to him. The damage could not be healed with an, 'I'm sorry'. She felt powerless, and she didn't like it anymore than she liked seeing a sad Oogie Boogie. She lingered near the oven for longer than she had to, peering inside to see a still raw potpie baking.

'Oh Oogie, you really are a genius!' Oogie mentally cackled at how gullible Molly was. It was just too perfect! He couldn't believe that she bought it; although she couldn't have known any better, since like she mentioned before, she wasn't living when the Christmas fiasco occurred. 'I'd better tell the brats about this so that they don't mess up my story. If she finds out it's a lie, she'll really never come around to see me anymore.'

Knowing she couldn't stand in front of the open oven forever to avoid uncomfortable conversation, Molly finally shut the door to the oven. Turning to her burlap sack friend, she then pulled out her playing cards, shuffling them in her hands. "Feel like playing while we wait?"

"No," Oogie replied grinning at her weakly, "I feel like winnin'."

Grinning in a more conspiring way back, Molly took her seat again, and crossed her leg over the opposite thigh, which in turn exposed part of her legs under her dress. "Well I can't really promise you that. We'll just have to see who the best card player is."

Oogie grinned a bit more genuinely as Molly began to deal, his empty eye sockets lingered lecherously upon her exposed legs, which was obvious she left open for his view to try and cheer him up. With these kinds of results, Oogie Boogie figured that maybe he should tell bogus sob stories more often. Especially when he could see all the way up to Molly's mid-thigh.

The sound of Werewolf's howl filled the air as Molly walked through the graveyard later that night. "I swear Oogie would make me stay with him in that lair forever if I couldn't talk some logic into that maggot-filled head of his," the rag doll sighed to herself. The truth was he almost tempted her into staying overnight with him again, however, she didn't pity Oogie Boogie that much. She allowed him to win the card games they played, in attempts to cheer him up, despite how irritating he was boasting of his own greatness, and talking in the third person after winning.

A chuckle escaped Molly as she remembered Oogie gloating over how he won some silly card games. At least then he seemed more like himself, and she'd rather be with an annoying Oogie Boogie, than be with a sad one. She just didn't know how to handle true sadness. She never really experienced it. She experienced frustration, and cried over that, but that paled in comparison to Oogie's own experiences. His injustices made her past feelings of dejection childish, and the rag doll felt a little ashamed. At least nobody tried to kill her for having feelings.

Molly's musings were interrupted when she finally stepped through the gates of Halloween Town, and was surprised to see what the citizens were up to now. With Halloween so close, one would assume that they would be feverously working on whatever task they needed to complete in order to meet their holiday's expectations. Instead, they all seemed to be looking high and low for something.

The question she was formulating in her head about what they were up to was soon answered when the Mayor spotted her. He got so excited upon seeing her, that he almost lost his balance and would have rolled around on the ground flailing and crying out for help, saying his infamous line about how he can't do certain things by himself. "Look! Molly's here! We found her!" This got everyone's attention and soon they all murmured amongst themselves; several of them even shouted out in triumph.

'They didn't find me, I came home on my own,' Molly thought dryly to herself, wanting to say so out loud, but restrained herself, since it wouldn't have fazed any of them. They all looked so happy that she was almost afraid they'd break out into song upon seeing her. However, they did not, so Molly felt grateful that she didn't have to waste three to four minutes of her life hearing them sing about how she came back to town.

Another question began in the confused rag doll's mind as she tried to cross the plaza without having the unsettling attention of pretty much everyone in Halloween Town greeting her and welcoming her as if she was someone important to their town, instead of one of it's delinquents. That question too, was answered quickly, as she heard the shrill voice of one of the few individuals of their town that probably rallied the citizens to go on a search party for her, – and judging by how happy they all seemed, the search had probably been going on for much longer than any of them would have liked – and that individual be her mother, Jewel.

"Molly Finkelstein!" Jewel's voice filled the air as she made her way towards her daughter, with Vladimir not too far behind her. Judging from her mother's tone and expression, she was not happy. Then again, Jewel had very few moments when she didn't seem that way. "Where have you been?" this question was more of a demand, and if her no-nonsense tone didn't make that obvious, the way she placed her hands impatiently on her hips did. Vladimir, along with the other townsfolk, began to stare at her more intently, since they too were probably wondering what made her stray from home so long and cause them to have to drop everything they were doing just to look for her.

Molly stood before the townspeople near the fountain, trying her best to stay calm, despite the uncomfortable gazes that were upon her. There were very few good excuses she could think of that might have a chance at pleasing this kind of crowd. She couldn't tell them what she was really doing, since they either wouldn't believe her, or Oogie Boogie's existence wouldn't be so secret anymore. Whatever Molly was going to tell them, she had to think of it fast, or risk revealing the secret of the Boogieman being alive. Something she didn't want happening since he wasn't just the arrogant Boogieman she met that day when she noticed the missing verse in their town's song. Oogie Boogie was her friend, and she would have to come up with a convincing lie for the entire town right now if she wanted to keep him safe.

* * *

Hehe, I am so evil aren't I? Here I don't update for five months, missing the main holidays when I should have updated, like Halloween, Christmas, and the first anniversary of the fanfic, and I have the nerve to make this chapter end with a cliffhanger. If you feel like flooding my email inbox with threatening messages, I will not blame you. I really hope you all enjoyed this chapter, to me this is the most groundbreaking chapter of all, since now the main plot of the fic is really starting to kick in.

I'd like to thank the following for their reviews:

Raptured Night

Phantom's Bride

Marissa

Alena Jamie Aberdeen

Kiely

Hearts Aglow

Twisted Destiny

Jack's Sweetie

Kaitlynn,

BloodyBess

Beany

Whiteangel

Moonliterider

Sparky

The Chimera

Queen Freaky

Darkest Fairy

Really, thank you all. I mean it. I know I took forever to update, but it's really fans like you who make me want to get off my butt and finish each chapter and try to put them up as fast as I can. I really hope you enjoyed the chapter, and I hope I don't take forever to update like I did last time. Remember, to read and review, because I love to hear from you readers :)

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


	12. XI: Surprise

Disclaimer: I do not own The Nightmare Before Chirstmas, Tim Burton does. I made up Molly but that's about it.

Author's Note: I am so sorry I pretty much have made you guys wait so long for another chapter of this fanfic. My life has been pretty stressful and busy in the time I have not updated. I had to worry about graduation from High School, which I did with honors which I wasn't even aware of until the day of! Then like two weeks afterwards I had an accident in which I tore a muscle in my knee and I couldn't even walk until about two or three months later. Now I'm stressing about finding a job but I hope to get one really soon. I really meant to update before Halloween but things didn't work out that way. Since my birthday is on the 7th of this month though, I decided to give you readers a birthday present from me to you. Please enjoy this new chapter of The Nightmare After Christmas!

* * *

Chapter Eleven: Surprise

Hours after the sun had risen into the sky, and while the citizens of Halloween Town were busy doing their part for their beloved holiday, Molly Finkelstein laid in bed. She had a hard time getting to sleep the night before, so when she finally did, she ended up sleeping in far later than she would have liked. Even once she realized she had woken up late, the rag doll kept laying in her bed, staring up at the ceiling. What happened last night was troubling her still, and Molly felt like she just wanted to lay in her bed, staring absently at the ceiling with her own thoughts. If it wasn't for her mother's knock on her door, Molly might have done this all day.

"Molly?" Jewel asked in a puzzled way as she cracked her door open enough for her head to poke into the room. "My dear, what are you still doing in bed?" Before her daughter could answer, Jewel seemed to come up with a reason all by herself. "You must have been tired from the day before. After all, from what you told us last night you had quite a busy day while you were away from home. But it's not good for you to sleep too much, so you should get up. Jack Skellington is here to see you down stairs by the way."

"Jack Skellington!" Molly repeated, sitting up in bed with widened eyes.

Jewel gave Molly a confused look, "Well yes, he came here to talk to you about what you told everyone last night. So get dressed quickly, can't make the Pumpkin King wait all day for you." She gave a teasing chuckle before she closed the door and left Molly alone to get herself ready for the new day.

Small fingers ran through her black locks as Molly groaned, and reluctantly pulled the covers away from her body. There was no way of avoiding this anymore, it seemed, and the sooner she faced everyone, the better it was. Last night she blurted out something she was now going to have to follow through with. How could she have lost her ability to come up with lies on the spot so quickly? There was no point in wasting her time thinking over what she could have done, as she got dressed and straightened herself out to face other people.

Oogie had been tinkering with his giant roulette table, since the other day he noticed it had begun to revolve slower than it should. "Must have busted the other day when I used it on ol' Vladdy boy," he concluded to himself, emitting a dark chuckle at the memory of torturing the annoying vampire. The Boogie Man was in quite a rare good mood that morning, and even he noticed the pleasant feelings as he worked on getting his contraption to work. It didn't seem as irritating as it might have been the other day. Perhaps it was because he didn't figure that he could have gotten Molly to believe in his little lie about the events of last year's Christmas Eve. Another chuckle escaped his lips as he narrowed his eyes with devious thoughts about how much undeserved sympathy he could get out of that rag doll of his.

Even the machine seemed to be working in his favor, as he tightened a screw and flipped the switch to see if it would work, and the roulette table lit up and began to whirl around at the speed it was suppose to at it's highest level. Oogie smiled widely as he shut the machine off, and it slowly quieted down again. Just when he was beginning to think that his morning couldn't get any better, he heard someone approaching. The voice he recognized was Molly's voice, and when he recognized it, he spoke to himself again. "Ha, well, well, well…she's come to visit ol' Oogie earlier than usual. Wonder what's the occasion?" He then pretended to realize something, "Oh, that's right, she must still be thinking I am down in the dumps 'bout what I told her yesterday. Better not disappoint her by acting too happy then. Heh heh heh."

But then he heard a voice that ruined his mood completely. The unmistakable voice of Jack Skellington, the King of Halloween, his archenemy, and would be slayer. 'Now just what is that pumpkin head doin' sticking his nose around my turf?' he wondered, while straining to listen to what the two were talking about. Soon their voices became easier to hear as they got closer to the tree house, where a window to his lair was able to let their voice carry into the darkness of his torture chamber.

Outside, Jack continued his conversation with Molly, not knowing that at the moment the biggest threat to his town was listening as well. "Are you sure you want to do this alone? With my experience, I can be a great help to you. I really don't mind at all. You seem a little nervous about it."

Molly shook her head, "No, I'll be fine Jack. This is something I got myself into, and I want to take care of it personally."

The Pumpkin King seemed to accept her decline with his help with a nod. "Alright then Molly, I'll leave this to you then. But might I give you a little advice before I let you go?" When Molly nodded her head, Jack continued, "Make sure not to think about it too much. It's really not too hard to do, as long as you are doing your best."

"T-thank you, I'll keep that in mind then," the rag doll replied.

Oogie moved away from the window, and began to pace around the room furiously. His good mood had left him just as quickly as it had come. "So she thinks she can best the Boogie Man? She thinks it will be easy? She wants to…do it herself?" Suddenly he gave a mock laugh, "Ha!" Narrowing his eyes into slits he continued to rant to himself, "She has no idea just who she's double crossing!" Tightening his pointed hand into a fist, he added venomously, "Jack got lucky last time, but I won't be beaten again! Not by some little rag doll I ain't!"

Molly's small boots clicked against the cold stone floor of Oogie's lair as she entered it. Once she was in the dark room, she exhaled. For some reason, she always felt a little uneasy around Jack, even before she started to lose her edge. After taking a few steps forward, she noticed the neon green figure that was Oogie Boogie was pacing around. She found slight amusement in watching him walk back and forth, muttering to himself irritably. "Don't tell me you think I'm late today?" she questioned him in mock curiosity after watching him for a minute or so. "Because if you ask me, I'd say I'm early."

Oogie stopped pacing when he heard Molly speak, and looked over at the amused doll. A grin began to spread across his face as he used a strange tone of voice to speak to her with. "Oh, I think your timing couldn't be more perfect, Doll Face."

"Oh?" Molly gave him a quizzical look, but his strange statement and behavior did not keep her from wanting to approach him. "Why's that?"

Still grinning, Oogie told her, "Because, I just finished giving the roulette table a bit of a tune up."

"Why?" she asked, still walking closer to him, not knowing that anything was out of the ordinary. "Does it do something new now?"

"Oh no," he replied, waiting for her to get close enough to him so that he could grab her by the arm, holding her tighter than he normally would have. "Here, let me show you," he said harshly, beginning to pull her towards the device.

Not understanding the sudden hostility from Oogie, Molly winced because it was unexpected of him to react to her like this, and also because his tightened grip was uncomfortable. "Ouch! Oogie, you're hurting me," she complained, while trying to push at him so that he could let her go, or at least loosen his grip.

"Oh am I?" Oogie questioned, before turning her to face him, grinning down at her surprised face and added coldly, "My mistake." Now he began to tighten his grip on her arm even more, making it quite painful for the smaller, weaker rag doll. When she let out a cry of pain, his grin faded to a dangerous glare. "And you made the mistake of thinkin' you can double cross me!"

"W-what are you talking about?" Molly stuttered, after groaning in pain, trying not to show how much he was hurting her. However, it was hard to mask her pain, as she felt fear flood into her chest and mind like it hadn't done in a long time. She didn't like feeling vulnerable, especially when Oogie was acting so unpredictably.

Showing no care for her safety, Oogie shoved her into the roulette table, and retorted, "I'm talking about your little conversation with Jack! I take it you didn't believe me?" He began, pretending to be asking her questions. "Decided you'd get ol' Bone Daddy's opinion on things?" Leaning over her, he continued to stare down at her with a fierce look in his blank sockets. "Well his opinions never have been too good, because I am NOT easy to beat!"

The rag doll let out another cry of pain as she fell against the hard metal, and fell down, feeling some of the sharp edges cut at her body. Suddenly Molly realized he must have overheard the conversation she was having with Jack earlier. "Wait, Oogie, let me explain," she pleaded with him, looking back up at him but not daring to get up, in case she was pushed down.

A heartless chuckle escaped the Boogie Man as he heard her pitiful plea. "Please do, I always liked a good story before a torture." While waiting for her side of the story, he folded his arms across his chest with a smirk.

Feeling like he wouldn't push her down again, Molly slowly stood up from the floor. "Last night when I came back to town, my mother made everyone go on a search party, and they all demanded to know where I was. I had to say something, and I couldn't come up with anything good."

"It must have been hard for you to think up the truth for a change, eh Doll Face?" Oogie sneered.

"I told them I was planning something for Halloween," Molly finally admitted, sounding upset that Oogie would jump to conclusions. "And I told them it was a surprise so they'd leave me alone about it. Jack then came over to my house to figure out what it was. He got really excited that I wanted to be apart of Halloween." She then shouted out, "I never even mentioned your name!"

Oogie narrowed his eyes in suspicion, "And just how do you expect me to believe you? I don't fall for traps easily, not when I'm an expert at them."

"Why would I tell them about you?" she asked, glaring more. "I've been hiding the fact that you're alive for so long, why would I bring it up now? Don't you think I would have told Jack a long time ago if I wanted him to know about you still being alive?"

Staring her down for a while, the Boogie Man replied, "You could always change your mind." He allowed his glare to slip away, and his arms to fall at his side.

"Well I didn't," she responded, and attempted to throw her arms up in the air. However, she only managed to do it with one, and realized that her other arm's seams had been nicked when she fell down. Now the appendage was dangling by her side, half attached. Sighing in irritation, she muttered to herself, "I can't believe you." Walking past Oogie, she then went in search for a room in his lair that had a bit more light.

"Hey, that should be my line!" Oogie complained as he watched her with a frown. He only stood alone for a moment before deciding to follow her, beginning to think that perhaps he did make a mistake, but wasn't completely sure he should trust her. After all, she had tricked him about other things. He followed her into the kitchen, where she sat at the table, and tried to sew her arm back with a needle and thread she kept in her shoe. Although she looked very focused, Molly was having a hard time reattaching her arm with the aid of only one hand. She also wasn't very skilled at sewing to begin with, so that made her task even harder. Oogie watched her until he realized that it was starting to annoy him watching her try and fail over and over. Sighing, he got closer to the rag doll, taking the needle from her and began to sew her arm with less effort and better results. "Look, what do you think I'd expect when I heard you talking with Jack," he began, saying Jack's name with great distaste. Before he continued, he made sure to put on a show of remorse that would hopefully make her feel more sympathetic towards him. "He got to Sally, didn't he? Why shouldn't I expect him to do the same with you?"

With a mock laugh, Molly snatched the needle from Oogie, and replied, "Well last time I checked, I wasn't Sally." Turning her head, she added in a stubborn tone, "And why should I let you sew my arm when you don't trust me?"

It was a good thing Molly was turned away from him, because Oogie looked about ready to explode. He needed to use whatever restraint he could muster at that moment to resist doing so, and instead turned away from her as well with slumped shoulders. "You may not be Sally, but you weren't here last year either. She was, and he still convinced her to believe in his lies." The accusing tone in his voice changed into a lower, somewhat sadder tone as he added for good measure, "You can leave if you want."

Molly didn't notice him leave as she went back to focusing on fixing her arm again. Oogie's work had made it easier for her to thread her arm, but since her skill wasn't so good, and it showed in her stitching. Once it was done though, she felt her face relax, and ran her hand through her head while propping her other elbow on the table in front of her, and holding her head in the palm of her hand. "What am I going to do about this surprise for Halloween?" she asked herself softly.

Oogie waited in the other room, idly tapping his hand on the wall and thinking to himself, 'This is all Jack's fault. Everything was going so well until the great Pumpkin King decided to step in where he doesn't belong!' After awhile, he got bored of waiting, and chose to go back into the kitchen. Since she hadn't left the room yet, he figured she wasn't planning to leave soon. The feelings of frustration left when he noticed the dull look in her eyes as she stared in front of her, with her chin propped in her hands. It just wasn't natural for her to look that way, not while in his presence. Her current expression made her look too doll-like, and it was kind of creepy when he was use to a more playful Molly. In an attempt to break the tension that he created, and to get her more animated, Oogie broke the silence between them by clearing his throat first and then asking, "So…tell me about this Halloween surprise?"

Silence fell between them again for several more moments, before Molly responded in a deadpan voice, "There's nothing to tell."

Upset that she continued this behavior with him, he frowned and told her, "Look, I told you if you wanted to leave then I won't stop you, but if you plan to stay I have better things to do than watch you pout."

Green eyes moved towards the Boogieman, before they narrowed and she spoke in a harsher tone, "I wasn't kidding. There is nothing to tell about it, since I had nothing planned. Weren't you listening to me before when I told you I couldn't think of a better lie last night?"

Oogie began to smirk despite himself at her response. "So you've gotten yourself into a bit of a bind have you?" When he was answered with a dry look from the raven-haired doll, he chuckled in amusement. "Oh I'm sure the great Molly Finkelstein can come up with something."

Molly was not in a good mood at the moment, and didn't feel like dealing with Oogie. Standing up, she spoke again in a dull tone of voice, "Maybe I should go."

"Now, now Doll Face, I was being serious," Oogie replied, still smirking. He figured she would be a little upset still over what happened between them, but it wasn't enough – in his opinion – to make her seriously want to leave. There was nothing a little flattery shouldn't do to change her mind. "After all, if you can manage to get away with cheating with the Oogie Boogie Man, I'm sure you can think of something that will awe the town. Shouldn't be too hard. Jack's performances are enough proof of just how easily they are impressed."

"Well when you've had practically no interest in Halloween it can be difficult to think of a surprise worthy enough for my absences," the rag doll argued back. She felt so drained, and the day had just started. Molly was still quite new to Halloween Town, and had yet to really understand what was so fulfilling about it. Now she found it a handicap that she had not been paying closer attention to what the other townspeople were up to during the year. In this state of stress she found herself in, she also realized she did not want to be around Oogie, who seemed to be enjoying her misfortune.

Taking a step back and pretending to be surprised, Oogie gasped in an overly exaggerated way. "What? Don't like Halloween? Well, I wouldn't tell them that." When Molly continued to walk away from him and heard her say her usual parting words that promised to see him later, the Boogieman's smirk was replaced with a deep frown as he yelled after her, "Well fine, it wasn't like I wasn't busy anyways!" Although as soon as she was out of his sights he began to mutter to himself, and realized that his good mood probably wasn't going to return that day.

* * *

For the rest of the day, Molly found herself doing something she normally never did; she walked through the streets of town, and observed everyone else. The rag doll realized how oblivious she had been to what the other citizens of her town truly did just from this outing. However, by the time the sun began to set, she still hadn't one idea on what to do for her surprise for the town. As she trudged back home, she found herself being confronted by the Mayor, who for once greeted her with the more cheerful face his head had to offer. "Less than two months left until the big day!" he informed her, and she felt grateful that he had not said this with the bullhorn he held in his hands. 

"Thanks for the reminder," Molly replied, trying not to make her voice sound as sarcastic as she felt like being with the Mayor. The Mayor didn't seem to notice her dreary tone, and only continued to smile and nodded as he stepped aside to head back to go home. Molly wasn't sure if she should shake her head at how oblivious most of the townspeople could be, or to be thankful for that.

Once she entered the Laboratory that she called home, she immediately heard her mother's voice calling out to her after the door finished moaning after being closed. "Molly? Is that you? Come over here I have a surprise for you!" Jewel said without looking away from the cauldron that was located several steps away from the front door. Just when Molly thought this couldn't have been a good surprise, her mother turned and beckoned her to come forward and look into the cauldron to see the contents inside. Knowing she could not escape her mother's wish, the rag doll approached the bubbling concoction, and immediately her nose picked up on the distinguished smell of Snake and Spider stew. Before she could say anything, Jewel spoke up again, "I know I don't really make this stew so much, but I thought you deserved it. After all, you've finally begun to show an interest in our town's cause of making a perfect Halloween!" Just as Molly began to feel the heavy feeling of guilt, her mother decided to add, "I'm very proud of you, and I can't wait to see what surprise you have come up with that will blow away even the Mayor's best Halloween ideas!"

Cracking a slight grin, and allowing herself to chuckle – which came out more nervous than the embarrassed one she was trying for – Molly replied, "Um…gee thanks, I appreciate this, but I really am feeling kind of tired."

"Oh that isn't a problem, go up to your room and rest," Jewel laughed, and waved off her daughter's hesitance at accepting her kindness. "The stew isn't ready yet, but when it is I'll take it up to your room when I go to serve your father up in his lab." Turning back to focus on her cooking, Dr. Finkelstein's wife shook her head as she muttered to herself more than to Molly, "Lately he has been so busy in his work with Igor that I wonder if he even notices what I make."

Molly didn't stick around to hear the rest of Jewel's muttering as she walked up the metallic ramp up to her room. After arriving in her room, she sighed in relief, and plunked herself on her bed, which made the springs squeak at the sudden addition of weight. Her focus went to the floor, as she continued to search her mind for an idea, only to discover that she hadn't a clue what to do for her surprise. 'I have less than two months to prepare something special that it takes the town a whole year to do. How am I ever going to be able to manage that? There's no way to really cheat either. Unless I did something someone else in town has been working on. Then again, that wouldn't really be a special surprise now would it?' Another sigh escaped her lips before she leaned back to lay on her bed. Her green eyes focused on the ceiling instead, and would stay there until her mother's knocking was heard against her door.

"Stew's ready!" Jewel said behind the door, with an unusually cheerful tone.

The rag doll sat up from her bed just in time to see her mother open the door and walk in. Placing the bowl down on the table in the room, she stood by the bowl, waiting to see Molly try her food. Realizing this, Molly slipped off of her bed on her feet, and took the spoon into her hand, and tasted the hot liquid. Glancing back to her mother's anxious face, she told her, "Tastes pretty good, thanks." While Jewel looked ecstatic and began to act humble about it, Molly thought to herself, 'Not as good as Oogie's though…' Then something clicked in her mind. A very wonderful idea, one that just might be able to work for her surprise. Without thinking about it, Molly declared, "I got it!"

Jewel gave her daughter a puzzled look at her sudden outburst, "Got what?" She was even more taken aback as she watched her daughter discard her spoon on the table and pick up the bowl and begin to drink from it. "Oh Molly!" she began to scold, "Don't do that! Your father does that all the time and it's just so disgusting, and not in a flattering way for a young lady!" Molly further surprised her mother by handing her the now empty bowl, and was now in a hurry to go back to Oogie's lair. "Wait, where are you going now?"

"Going back to work on that surprise! I just got a great idea! And I'm going to need help from Lock, Shock, and Barrel!" Molly shouted back over her shoulder as she descended the metallic ramp and dashed out the door before her mother could protest.

* * *

Oogie had not expected Molly to return to his lair that night, especially looking like she had come in a big hurry from how she was panting with hair slightly disheveled. He could not help but stare at her for a long time without saying a word, until he bluntly asked, "What happened to you?" 

A grin spread across her face as she tried to regain her breath enough to reply, "J-just an answer to our problems." Approaching him, she placed a hand on his shoulder in a friendly gesture, but also so that she could keep her balance. Once she was able to talk with a bit more ease, she asked, "How would you like to be the one who gets to come see me for a change?"

At a loss for words, Oogie continued to just stare at her, although now it was in a suspicious way as he studied her as if she had lost her mind. "Now I'm curious, just what **did** happen to you?"

"Oh just answer a simple question for a change." Molly chuckled before adding in a teasing tone, "You can answer simple questions, right?"

Insulted, Oogie responded defensively with his usual frown, "Why should I when you haven't answered mine?"

"Because I asked mine first," Molly answered simply as she began to poke at his stomach with her other hand. "That's why."

Oogie frowned more, as he thought to himself that technically he had asked his question first, but knew that she would still probably avoid his question until he gave up and answered hers first. "Fine, I guess I could pay you a little visit," he began with his usual tone, but then it changed to annoyed. "And then I can get chased out of town by Jack's mob of morons afterwards."

"Well what if you didn't have to worry about that?" the rag doll asked with a raised brow in amusement.

Oogie raised one of his brows as well, though his was in curiosity. Secretly he wondered just how many questions he'd have to answer before she would tell him the answer to his own. Experience with Molly taught him not to bother mentioning this injustice though, so instead he told her, "Well that would be different. What are you trying to tell me Doll Face?"

"Well I just don't think it's fair that I have to go sneaking around just to visit a friend," Molly explained as she removed her hand from his shoulder to place them on her hips. "So why don't I tell the town that **you** are my special Halloween surprise project! I could tell them that I revived you for Halloween. After all, it just wouldn't be the same without the Boogieman." She looked very pleased as she informed Oogie of her plan. "And it wouldn't be that hard for them to believe, after all, I am friends with your loyal little henchmen. If anyone would know how to bring you back it would be them." She paused with a large smile at her own brilliance before asking him, "So what do you think?"

Dryly, Oogie replied, "Mmm yes, that sure would be a surprise. Halloween Town would just love to tear me apart at the seams." Folding his arms over his chest he concluded, "Not a good idea Doll, unless that's what you wanted."

Molly narrowed her eyes in irritation at his response. "You really think that's what I want?"

"I don't know, would you?" he asked, narrowing his eyes as well. "Last time you were here you didn't really seem to care much about me!"

A mocking laugh escaped the rag doll, "Well that's because you were trying to tear me apart yourself!"

"Because I thought I had a reason to!" Oogie argued in his defense.

"Only because you jumped to conclusions!" Molly yelled back as she leaned in close to his face with a scowl.

Glowering back at her, Oogie also leaned in. "Well you were slow at tellin' me what Jack was doin' hangin' 'round with ya. S'not my fault!"

"Well you didn't exactly give me a chance to explain myself," Molly clarified as she moved closer to his face. "You just assumed I had blabbed to Jack about you still being alive, and hiding in your lair because you're so afraid of him!"

"I am not afraid of Jack! The great Oogie Boogie fears nobody!" Oogie declared in a more firm voice while moving close enough to Molly's face so that her nose pressed against the area on his face where his nose would have been if he had one.

If it were physically possible to move any closer to Oogie, Molly would have, but since it wasn't, the only action she took was to mutter softly while still glaring into his dark sockets, "Batsnot."

A snort escaped Oogie as he laughed in her face, "Ha! This time you lose." Leaning back and looking triumphant, he added, "Even cheating won't help you this time."

"Oh please, it's obvious you're afraid of Jack," Molly rolled her eyes at Oogie's arrogance. "Otherwise you wouldn't stay in this lair all day, every day."

The Boogieman grinned, as he told her, "Just because I'm not an idiot doesn't mean I'm afraid, but I guess you wouldn't know the difference."

Molly looked at him with disgusted as she sighed. "Fine, I won't help you get your freedom back." Sharply turning her back on him, she threw her head up so that her nose was in the air and added a, "Humph!"

"As if you could," Oogie scoffed.

"I could have," she stated without looking at him.

"I'd like to see you prove that," he muttered to her back.

Exasperated, she shot one more glare back at him and shouted, "How can I when you won't even cooperate with me?"

"If it means callin' your bluff I just might," he answered.

Molly turned her head forward again as she continued to stand with her back to him. "Well it might help if you stopped being an egotistical jerk!"

Glaring at her back Oogie sneered, "Wasn't aware I was, so maybe I'll be one a little longer."

Molly laughed at him before telling him in a cold tone, "Then maybe I won't tell you how I figured out how to convince the townspeople not to kill you as soon as they see you."

"Then I guess you won't be proving me wrong then," Oogie's replied with a hint of amusement.

"Nope," said the rag doll, "I'll just be proving that you're afraid of change."

"Batsnot."

"Just keep telling yourself that fat boy."

Oogie Boogie gave her back an annoyed glare before growling in irritation. For a long time the two stood there brooding in silence. That was until Oogie felt like being the one to catch Molly off guard for once. Creeping up to her as quietly as he could, he then wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her down as he sat on the ground. Molly's eyes widened when she felt her posterior fall onto Oogie's lap and looked to the Boogieman for an explanation. "So are you going to tell me this ingenious plan or not? Because if not then just leave!"

"You obviously don't want me to leave," Molly pointed out as she glanced down at the burlap arm that held her in place on Oogie's lap.

"Keep on pesterin' me and maybe I will," he warned her.

Molly couldn't help but laugh, "Okay, then I won't pester you. How about that?"

"Good idea," Oogie replied, "now, let's hear the other one, shall we?"

Trying her best to ignore the arm around her waist, Molly began to tell him about her idea. "Well they think that Jack got rid of you for good last year, right? So wouldn't that make your past actions nullified by your death? You've been alive for awhile now, and you haven't done anything bad, have you?"

Oogie's face twisted into an evil smirk as he remembered torturing Vladimir. "Nothin' they'd know about."

"See? They don't even know you're alive right now," Molly continued. "And if I tell them you're still innocent of doing anything bad, in front of everyone, Jack would end up looking like a bad guy if he, or anyone else tried to hurt you." She finished with a smile, hoping that this time he would agree with her.

He looked thoughtful, before telling her, "It's got a few bugs in it, but it might work. If we played our cards right that is."

"And I always do," Molly replied with a grin.

"So do I," Oogie chuckled, as he thought, 'This should be interesting.'

"We've got less than two months to work on this plan," she informed him in a serious tone. "If we're going to pull this off we'll need all the time we can get. Hmmm…" Rubbing her chin she thought for a moment before snapping her fingers. "I'll tell my family I need to focus on this surprise as much as I can, and that I'll stay with Lock, Shock, and Barrel until it's finished!"

A wide grin spread across Oogie's face at the idea of having Molly stay with him for practically two months straight. Without that annoying obligation she had to return to town, he could enjoy her company without her nagging at him about having to leave sooner or later. "I really like the way you think Doll Face. But if you're going to stay here for awhile, there is one thing I should tell you…"

"What?" she asked puzzled.

He chuckled as he pulled her closer to him and replied, "You gotta be my pillow."

Rolling her eyes, she responded, "I could figure that out for myself."

"Like I said, " he told her with another chuckle before leaning close to her face, "I like the way you think."

The rag doll smirked, but said nothing more in reply to his statement.

* * *

Well at least this time I didn't leave you guys with a cliffhanger! Again I am sooo sorry for updating this like eight or nine months later from the last chapter. And what's worse is I also started a new fic and posted two chapters on it before updating this one. It's an Okage fanfic, so if any of you happen to know and love that game, please check it out. I will begin working on the new chapter for that one probably as you read this. I would like to thank all my readers for being so patient for this next chapter to come out. Thanks for not threatening my life in my absence from updating. 

I'd like to thank the following for their reviews:

Raptured Night

Phyllis Joy Wolfe

TheChimera

Hearts Aglow

Beany

Jack's Sweetie

Marissa

Alena Jamie Aberdeen

Destinybound

Afficiando

Kaitlynn

WhiteAngel

Cartoonatic55

Rimedy

I've noticed there's some new names among those who reviewed last time I updated. Love you all! Keep reading and reviewing and being patient for the next updates! And I hope you all had a nice Halloween last week!

LaterZ,

Sydney Daimao


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